Category Archives: Republican

Legislative proposals to curb Virginia utilities political contributions may be gaining new traction in Richmond as old resentments over a 2015 utility rate freeze law combine with progressive Democrats skepticism of utility influence and Republican anger over Dominion Energys contributions to a shadowy PAC attacking Gov. Glenn Youngkin during the 2021 elections.

Del. Lee Ware, R-Powhatan, said proposals by him, Sen. Chap Petersen, D-Fairfax, and Sen. Richard Stuart, R-Stafford, have a very good chance at clearing the Republican-controlled House of Delegates. Petersen said he expects the support of a portion of Democrats in the Senate they narrowly control.

I cant get them all. I certainly cant get the ones that are more senior in leadership, said Petersen during a news conference Monday with Ware. But I can get a portion of my caucus.

Garren Shipley, a spokesperson for House Republicans, said party members havent discussed [the bills] at length yet as a caucus.

State Sen. Chap Petersen, D-Fairfax City.

Petersen also called on Youngkin to throw his support behind the proposals. Both he and Ware said they had spoken to the new governor, with Ware indicating Youngkin sees some affinity with their goals, but the administration has taken no public stance on the legislation.

The commonwealth needs the new governor to take a firm stand on this issue, and my hope is that will change the dynamic, said Petersen.

Political contributions by utilities have been a hot-button issue in Virginia in recent years largely due to Dominion, the states largest electric utility and for many years the biggest corporate donor in state politics. Many of the loudest voices for reform have come from an influx of progressive Democrats starting in 2017, who in a lot of ways moved the needle on this issue, said Petersen, an early proponent of restrictions on public service corporation political giving.

In last years race for governor, the company sparked particular outrage among Republicans by bankrolling amysterious PAC effortmeant to depress turnout for Youngkin in rural areas. At the time, Dominion claimed it was unaware of the PACs activities, but post-election financial disclosures show the utility and its executives provided almost half the money the PAC received,according to Cardinal News.

Factions of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have expressed discomfort with what they describe as Dominions outsize influence over the General Assembly, which has passed a series of laws favorable to the utility over the past decade, including a controversial rate freeze in 2015 that remained in place until 2018 and broughtin hundreds of millions of dollarsin excess profits, according to state regulators.

While utilities such as Dominion are great companies, Ware said Monday, they need to be responsible to the State Corporation Commission and not use massive lobbying monies and a large lobbying corps to get around and get what they want from the assembly.

Similarly, Petersen described a scenario where you have a state monopoly, a state utility thats not just donating money to campaigns, but also doing so in a way that frankly can be devious, that can be perhaps intended to mislead voters as opposed to inform voters, where again you have a monopolistic company that has a captive audience that is spreading money around the General Assembly and using that to structure the state law.

Asked about its stance on Petersen and Wares legislation and Petersens comments, Dominion spokesperson Rayhan Daudani said in an email that campaign finance laws should apply to all equally.

The anti-Youngkin ads Dominion helped finance have also inspired a push to tighten state laws on when PACs have to report their spending activity.Legislationsponsored by Sen. David Suetterlein, R-Roanoke County, would require PACs to report large pre-election expenditures of $1,000 or more, bringing more immediate transparency while votes are being cast rather than after an election is over.

In a floor speech Monday, Suetterlein said the Dominion-backed ads, which portrayed Youngkin as soft on guns, were most unusual.

There is no excuse for what happened, he said. We need more disclosure in this commonwealth.

Last year, Youngkins campaign responded to the ad controversy by suggesting entrenched interests were rallying behind his opponent, former Gov. Terry McAuliffe, because they were afraid of his outsider status. However, after Youngkins victory, Dominion donated $50,000 to his inaugural committee,according to the Virginia Public Access Project.

Asked Monday where the governor stands on reining in utility donations, Youngkin spokesperson Macaulay Porter said: The governor will review all legislation that comes to his desk.

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Republican anger, progressive concern combine in push to ban political spending by utilities - Fauquier Times

By House Minority Leader Blake A. Filippi

Good evening Rhode Island, Im Blake Filippi, the Republican leader in your House of Representatives.

It is time for Rhode Island to have a difficult discussion. Our State has limitless potential but we must first confront some uncomfortable truths.

Now, we may have our differences, but Republicans, most Democrats arent your enemy, either. Democrats, most Republicans arent your enemy, either.

The truth is, for the vast majority of us, our common struggle is to shake off the entrenched special interests who run this state and for us to unify with a common purpose for our future. To do that, we must have honest and frank conversations.

The pandemic: the uncomfortable truth about the pandemic is that our Government has abandoned the rule of law and our system of checks and balances, and undermines our most basic liberties.

And your General Assembly, which is supposed to be the check and balance on the Governor during emergencies, has handed over the keys, with little meaningful oversight.

For nearly two years we have been governed by a never ending stream of executive orders and regulations;

And all this has been by executive action. No laws passed. No debate. And little meaningful public involvement.

Understanding the hazard of perpetual executive rule, in July, our General Assembly did the right thing and passed a law that limited many of the Governors core emergency powers to 180-days only.

And how did Governor McKee respond?

He did not follow the law and seek the General Assemblys waiver from the 180-day limit. Rather, in August, he sought to skirt the law by declaring a new COVID emergency, to give himself a new 180-day period to govern us by executive order.

It is lawless, and the uncomfortable truth is that most of Governor McKees recent executive orders are unlawful.

No matter our opinion about how to address the pandemic, and there are many differing ones, I understand that, we cannot abandon the rule of law and our constitutional separations of powers. It is destructive to society and will have long-term consequences.

We continue to call for the General Assembly to exercise meaningful oversight of the Governors COVID response, and to ensure that the law is followed.

Another uncomfortable truth is that Rhode Island is not living up to its potential, and hasnt for a long time.

We hold on so tightly to the past and to entrenched special interest groups that we miss out on our future.

We are smack in the middle of one of the wealthiest regions on earth, yet were stagnant; our best and brightest leave to find opportunity; our seniors move for financial security, and we dont enjoy real transformative investment.

Rhode Islands hope for a prosperous future passes us by, and we must take concrete action to right the ship.

However, everything we do every great idea, all the fancy speeches mean nothing if we dont prepare the next generation of Rhode Islanders to be highly educated, critically-thinking citizens.

Education is the rock upon which great societies are built. It is a civil rights issue that, more than anything, will determine our future.

Yet, the hard truth is that we are failing generations of Rhode Islanders predominantly in struggling communities.

The state took over the Providence school system after decades of failure, and had the opportunity to set a new course, to make fundamental changes.

Instead, Governor McKee inked a new teacher contract with no meaningful reforms. Status quo the old way. Children Second.

We love our teachers. We love our students. And because we expect greatness from them both, we must provide opportunities to achieve excellence in education.

Republicans have proposed transformational plans to allow parents the choice to get their children out of failing schools, and into school systems that will build strong adults.

To the many decision makers who oppose our plans: if you fail to offer your own concrete solutions to this crisis, you are part of the problem, you hold on to the past at the expense of our childrens future.

Education in our state can be saved, but only if we exercise the political will to do so.

We must also face the uncomfortable truth that we have a self-inflicted medical provider crisis.

In 2018, one of the best, well-funded hospital groups in the world, Partners Healthcare, had a deal to buy our struggling Care New England hospital group to enter the Rhode Island healthcare marketplace with the latest and greatest technology, and massive capital investment.

Lifespan and Brown University lobbied the Raimondo administration, who then killed the Partners deal so Lifespan and Brown could instead scoop up Care New England and control over 80% of healthcare delivery in this state.

80% is a veritable healthcare monopoly that is a prescription for disaster, taking away medical choice and innovation from patients, and driving up costs.

And healthcare workers: youll be stuck at the only employer in town.

This scheme is more holding onto the old way of doing business benefiting special interest groups now at the cost of our health.

Thankfully, this monopoly must first be approved by our Governor and Attorney General, as well as the Federal Trade Commission.

To Governor McKee and Attorney General Neronha, do not approve this healthcare monopoly. Do not sacrifice our health to special interests!

Rhode Island must also move on from its past as a bad place for small business. Weve all heard the tales of over-regulation and bureaucratic madness.

The truth is: Government regulation has largely been used by corporate America to consolidate by squeezing out small businesses that cant afford to compete. Think about that: Our own government unwittingly aids the destruction of our small business economy.

The same is true for our system of economic development in this state. The rich, and the politically connected, obtain handouts of taxpayer money, and the average business just cant compete. These handouts are on the backs of every Rhode Islander, they add up, and hold us all down.

We must remember that the only thing that is too big to fail is our system of free enterprise.

Our State Government must get out of the way, and secure free and fair markets, so that we can all compete on a level playing field, where small businesses can thrive, and which will lead to the ground up organic investment we need.

Otherwise, expect the continued growth of large corporations at the expense of our small business base.

While sticking its nose where it doesnt belong, governments core functions are neglected and not just education.

Neighbors, Rhode Island needs to shed the past and set a new course, to live up to our potential, and seize the future.

We have so much opportunity! Were located between Boston and New York, have stunning natural beauty, a great quality of life, a diverse, warm and inclusive population, deep water ports, integrated highway and train systems, top-notch universities, an now an international airport. People want to live here, if they can afford it. We have all the pieces in place to thrive!

Yet, instead of seizing the future, many Rhode Island leaders perpetuate divisive cultural issues, that consume and distract us, while important generational challenges are barely discussed maintaining the status quo.

The truth is, in Rhode Island, its not about being a Democrat or Republican. Its about those with power and influence who call the shots and always get ahead, versus those without power and influence who are always left to foot the bill and suffer the consequences.

Rhode Island Republicans promise to always call out those who abuse their power and influence, and to defend those that suffer it.

And I pray youll join us in this endeavor: because your involvement is the only way Rhode Island will ever achieve its potential.

Please look to the future with hope, and know our state is worth fighting for.

Our path is ultimately your choice, Rhode Island, and I am confident we will choose wisely.

I thank you for your time, and Goodnight.

End of transcript.

Carlos Muoz can be reached at carlos.munoz@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @ReadCarlos.

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READ: The Republican response to Governor Daniel J. McKees 2022 State of the State address - The Boston Globe

WASHINGTON Representative John Katko of New York, a centrist Republican who broke with his party last year to vote to impeach former President Donald J. Trump, announced on Friday that he would not run for re-election.

Mr. Katko was one of 10 House Republicans to vote to impeach Mr. Trump and is the third member of that group to announce his retirement.

In a statement that fell almost exactly one year after that vote, Mr. Katko said he decided to call it quits in order to enjoy my family and life in a fuller and more present way. He added that the loss of both his own parents and his wifes parents in the last three years provided life-changing perspective for me.

My conscience, principles, and commitment to do whats right have guided every decision Ive made as a member of Congress, and they guide my decision today, he said.

Mr. Katko, a former federal prosecutor, had grown increasingly marginalized by conservatives at home and among House Republicans on Capitol Hill, who have demanded total loyalty to Mr. Trump, played down the severity of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot and eschewed working with President Biden. Those who veer off that course have found themselves attracting primary challengers, being pushed to the partys sidelines, or both.

Mr. Katkos sins in the eyes of his own party included supporting the creation of an independent commission to investigate the Capitol riot and backing a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure plan championed by Mr. Biden. He had already drawn three primary challengers and, if he survived that, was facing the likelihood of a brutal general election campaign.

New York Democrats, who tried and failed for years to oust him from the Syracuse-based seat, are currently eying new congressional lines that could make the district virtually unwinnable for Republicans, even in a year that officials in both parties believe favors the G.O.P.

Democrats and Mr. Trump found rare common ground to cheer Mr. Katkos decision.

Great news, another one bites the dust, Mr. Trump, who had offered to help those vying to unseat Mr. Katko in a primary, said in a statement.

Abel Iraola, a spokesman for House Democrats campaign arm, said the retirement highlighted how the Republican Partys rightward drift has made it toxic for so-called G.O.P. moderates.

Mr. Katko had been among a shrinking group of lawmakers who appealed to voters outside of his own party. When Mr. Biden won his central New York district in 2020 by 9 points in 2020, Mr. Katko prevailed by 10.

But the same centrist credentials that allowed Mr. Katko to hang onto his seat made him a target in conservative circles. After Republican leaders tasked him to work with Democrats on a proposal to create an independent Jan. 6 commission, they then abandoned the effort in favor of shielding Mr. Trump and the party from further scrutiny, urging lawmakers to oppose the plan Mr. Katko had negotiated.

When Democrats formed their own select committee to investigate the riot anyway, Mr. Katko infuriated hard-right members by voting in October to hold Stephen K. Bannon in criminal contempt of Congress for stonewalling their inquiry.

And Mr. Katko was one of 13 House Republicans who voted in November for the infrastructure bill, leading some in his party to brand him and the other G.O.P. supporters of the legislation traitors, and to call for Mr. Katko to be stripped of his leadership role on the Homeland Security Committee. He had been in line to become the panels chairman if Republicans won control of the House.

The anger from his right flank followed Mr. Katko home. The Conservative Party, a minor party in New York that backs Republicans in most races, had denounced him last April and formally withdrew its support from his re-election bid after he voted for a Democratic bill extending protections for gay and transgender rights.

Bernard Ment, the party chairman in Onondaga County, home to Syracuse, said that position was the last straw. In an interview, he called Mr. Katko a Democrat, though he retained support from his local Republican Party organization.

Hes been the one guy whos tried to work on both sides of the aisle, Mr. Ment said. The problem is hes managed to alienate a lot of conservative voters and tick off a lot of Republicans, and I dont think he can make up the ground with Democratic voters.

Democrats who control New York state government in Albany are widely expected to try to pad the district with new Democratic voters as they redraw the states congressional districts in the coming weeks, giving their party a stark advantage in November. Three Democrats two of them veterans have already entered the race.

With Mr. Katko and his crossover appeal out of the way, Democrats are likely to be less fearful of a Republican winning his district, giving them more wiggle room to further expand their majority as they redraw the map. New lines could yield as many as four new seats for Democrats in the House and deny Republicans five they currently hold. (New York is slated to lose one congressional seat this year after nationwide reapportionment.)

Mr. Katko, for his part, has maintained that he was focusing on supporting his partys policy priorities, lashing against Mr. Bidens immigration policies in particular, and working to bring home results for his district. In a statement last year, he made clear how dangerous he believed the former presidents conduct was in the run up to Jan. 6.

To allow the president of the United States to incite this attack without consequence is a direct threat to the future of our democracy, Mr. Katko said. For that reason, I cannot sit by without taking action.

Nicholas Fandos reported from New York.

Excerpt from:

Republican Who Voted to Impeach Trump Wont Seek Re-election - The New York Times

TALLAHASSEE (The Borowitz Report)As he explores a bid for the 2024 Republican Presidential nomination, Governor Ron DeSantis is betting that G.O.P. voters are looking for a stupider version of Donald J. Trump.

According to a source close to DeSantis, the Florida Governor has decided to run to the stupid of Trump to pick up the support of voters who now consider the former President too intellectual.

When Trump recently said that he got the booster, that was the last straw, the source said. In the eyes of a lot of Republicans, Trump is basically Fauci now.

Trumps surrender to science is a slippery slope, the source added. Its only a matter of time before he starts flirting with geography and grammar.As DeSantis stakes his claim to the dumber-than-Trump lane, he spoke at a fund-raising event over the weekend.

Donald Trump believes that one plus one equals two, the Governor told his audience. I think the American people should be free to decide for themselves what one plus one equals.

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DeSantis Betting That Republicans Want a Stupider Version of Trump - The New Yorker

Rep. Jeff FortenberryJeffrey (Jeff) Lane FortenberryNebraska Republican tests positive for COVID-19 in latest congressional breakthrough case GOP rep facing charges of lying to FBI announces reelection bid Judge rejects Rep. Jeff Fortenberry's bid to dismiss charges MORE (R-Neb.) tested positive for COVID-19 on Tuesday, becoming the latest congressional lawmaker to announce a breakthrough case.

The congressman said he is experiencing a moderate coronavirus case and will as a result vote by proxy this week.

Though I have been vaccinated and took every precaution to avoid infection, I have contracted a moderate case of COVID-19, Fortenberrywrote in a statement. Per House protocol, I will be recuperating and working from home, and will vote by proxy. As always, my excellent team is ready and available to serve the needs of all Nebraskans.

Congressional lawmakers have reported at least 50 breakthrough cases of COVID-19 since last summer, more than half ofthem contracted since mid-December.

Rep. David TroneDavid John TroneNebraska Republican tests positive for COVID-19 in latest congressional breakthrough case The Hill's Morning Report - Presented by Facebook - Voting rights week for Democrats (again) Maryland Democrat announces positive COVID-19 test MORE (D-Md.) announced a positive test on Saturday, and Diana DeGetteDiana Louise DeGetteNebraska Republican tests positive for COVID-19 in latest congressional breakthrough case The Hill's Morning Report - Presented by Facebook - Voting rights week for Democrats (again) Maryland Democrat announces positive COVID-19 test MORE (D-Colo.) revealed that she came down with the virus on Monday.

Capitol physician Brian Monahan revealed earlier this month that among members, the seven-day average positivity rate had risen from less than 1 percent to greater than 13 percent.

The Centers for Disease Control and Preventionsays on its website that while COVID-19 breakthrough cases are expected, fully vaccinated individuals who test positive for the virus are less likely to develop severe illness compared to those who have not received the jab.

Fortenberrys positive case comes as the U.S. is currently seeing a spike in infections nationwide, driven largely by the highly transmissible omicron variant. Deaths, however, have remained at rates lower than previous waves of the pandemic.

Early data suggests that the infection from the omicron variant may be less severe than other strains of the virus.

Fortenberry made headlines earlier this month when a federal judge denied his bid to dismiss charges he is facing for allegedly lying to authorities about illicit campaign contributions. The congressman was indicted in October after being accused of hiding information and making false statements to authorities regarding illegal campaign contributions passed into the U.S. from Nigerian billionaire Gilbert Chagoury.

Authorities allege that a California group passed $30,000 from Chagoury to Fortenberrys 2016 campaign.

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Nebraska Republican tests positive for COVID-19 in latest congressional breakthrough case | TheHill - The Hill

For months, former President Donald J. Trump has been grumbling quietly to friends and visitors to his Palm Beach mansion about a rival Republican power center in another Florida mansion, some 400 miles to the north.

Gov. Ron DeSantis, a man Mr. Trump believes he put on the map, has been acting far less like an acolyte and more like a future competitor, Mr. Trump complains. With his stock rising fast in the party, the governor has conspicuously refrained from saying he would stand aside if Mr. Trump runs for the Republican nomination for president in 2024.

The magic words, Trump has said to several associates and advisers.

That long-stewing resentment burst into public view recently in a dispute over a seemingly unrelated topic: Covid policies. After Mr. DeSantis refused to reveal his full Covid vaccination history, the former president publicly acknowledged he had received a booster. Last week, he seemed to swipe at Mr. DeSantis by blasting as gutless politicians who dodge the question out of fear of blowback from vaccine skeptics.

Mr. DeSantis shot back on Friday, criticizing Mr. Trumps early handling of the pandemic and saying he regretted not being more vocal in his complaints.

The back and forth exposed how far Republicans have shifted to the right on coronavirus politics. The doubts Mr. Trump amplified about public health expertise have only spiraled since he left office. Now his defense of the vaccines even if often subdued and almost always with the caveat in the same breath that he opposes mandates has put him uncharacteristically out of step with the hard-line elements of his partys base and provided an opening for a rival.

But that it was Mr. DeSantis a once-loyal member of the Trump court wielding the knife made the tension about much more.

At its core, the dispute amounts to a stand-in for the broader challenge confronting Republicans at the outset of midterm elections. They are led by a defeated former president who demands total fealty, brooks no criticism and is determined to sniff out, and then snuff out, any threat to his control of the party.

That includes the 43-year-old DeSantis, who has told friends he believes Mr. Trumps expectation that he bend the knee is asking too much. That refusal has set up a generational clash and a test of loyalty in the de facto capital of todays G.O.P., one watched by Republicans elsewhere whove ridden to power on Mr. Trumps coattails.

Already, party figures are attempting to calm matters.

Theyre the two most important leaders in the Republican Party, said Brian Ballard, a longtime Florida lobbyist with connections to both men, predicting Mr. Trump and Mr. DeSantis will be personal and political friends for the rest of their careers.

Mr. Trumps aides also have tried to tamp down questions about the former presidents frustrations, so as not to elevate Mr. DeSantis.

Still, Mr. Trump has made no secret of his preparations for a third run for the White House. And while Mr. DeSantis, who is up for re-election this year, has not declared his plans, he is widely believed to be eyeing the presidency.

Mr. Trump and his aides are mindful of Republicans increasingly public fatigue with the drama that trails Mr. Trump. The former presidents false claims about fraud in the 2020 election which Mr. DeSantis has not challenged and his role in the events leading to the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol have some Republicans looking for a fresh start.

Mr. DeSantis is often the first name Republicans cite as a possible Trump-style contender not named Trump.

DeSantis would be a formidable 2024 candidate in the Trump lane should Trump not run, said Dan Eberhart, a Republican donor. Hes Trump but a little smarter, more disciplined and brusque without being too brusque.

Notably, Mr. Trump, a longtime student of charisma and mass appeal, as well as an avid reader of polling, has refrained so far from publicly attacking Mr. DeSantis, who is a distant but potent second to him in polls on the 2024 G.O.P. field. His restraint is a break from the mockery and bullying he often uses to attack Republicans he perceives as vulnerable. Mr. Trump made no reference to the governor at a rally in Arizona on Saturday.

Mr. DeSantis has $70 million in the bank for his re-election, a war chest he stocked with help from the Republican rank-and-file and donor class, alike. He has raised his profile in the same spaces Mr. Trump once dominated. The governor is ubiquitous on Fox News, where he is routinely met with the sort of softballs that once arced toward Mr. Trump. And he frequently mixes with the well-tanned Republican donor community near the former presidents winter home in South Florida.

It was not always this way.

Mr. DeSantis was a little-known Florida congressman in 2017, when Mr. Trump, who was then the president, spotted him on television and took keen interest. Mr. DeSantis, an Ivy League-educated military veteran and smooth-talking defender of the new president, was exactly what Mr. Trump liked in a politician.

It wasnt long before Mr. Trump blessed Mr. DeSantiss bid for governor and sent in staff to help him, lifting the lawmaker to a victory over a better-known rival for the partys nomination.

Mr. DeSantis survived the general election and has often governed in a style that mirrors his patron, slashing at the left and scrapping with the news media. But that alone doesnt placate Mr. Trump. As with other Republicans he has endorsed, the former president appears to take a kind of ownership interest in Mr. DeSantis and to believe that he is owed dividends and deference.

Look, I helped Ron DeSantis at a level that nobodys ever seen before, Mr. Trump said in an interview for a forthcoming book, Insurgency, on the rightward shift of the Republican Party, by the New York Times reporter Jeremy W. Peters. Mr. Trump said he believed Mr. DeSantis didnt have a chance of winning without his help.

The former presidents expectation of deference from Mr. DeSantis is a reminder to other Republicans that a Trump endorsement comes with a price, a demand that could prove particularly consequential should he run again and have a stable of Republican lawmakers in his debt.

At times, Mr. Trump has sought to kindle his relationship with Mr. DeSantis. He has suggested the governor would be a strong choice for vice president. Similar courtship has helped win deference from other potential rivals. But Mr. DeSantis has not relented.

I wonder why the guy wont say he wont run against me, Mr. Trump has said to several associates and advisers, who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe private conversations.

Mr. Trump began the recent contretemps by attacking the governors refusal to acknowledge whether he had received a Covid-19 booster shot.

The answer is Yes, but they dont want to say it, because theyre gutless, Mr. Trump said in a television interview this month, referring only to politicians but clearly alluding to Mr. DeSantis. You got to say it whether you had it or not, say it.

Mr. DeSantiss response came on Friday in an interview on the conservative podcast Ruthless. Speaking in front of an in-person audience near St. Petersburg, Fla., the governor said one of his biggest regrets was not forcefully opposing Mr. Trumps calls for lockdowns when the coronavirus first began to spread in the spring of 2020.

Knowing now what I know then, if that was a threat earlier, I would have been much louder, Mr. DeSantis said. The governor said he had been telling Trump stop the flights from China but argued he never thought in early March 2020 that the virus would lead to locking down the country.

Mr. DeSantis then moved quickly to place blame on Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, who advised Trump on the countrys Covid response, a much safer target with conservatives.

The former president did not immediately respond. Without a Twitter account, his hair-trigger retorts have become less frequent. A spokesman for Mr. Trump also did not respond to requests for comment. An adviser to Mr. DeSantis declined to comment.

Mr. DeSantis, however, has touched on a delicate issue, one of the few on which Mr. Trump is to the left of his partys hard-liners: the efficacy of the vaccine and deference to public health experts advice on how to curb the spread of the virus.

Mr. Trump has begun blasting warning shots at Mr. DeSantis and other aspiring Republicans, signaling he intends to defend the vaccines his administration helped develop. In an interview with Candace Owens, a right-wing media personality, the former president said the vaccine worked and dismissed conspiracy theories. People arent dying when they take the vaccine, he said.

Mr. DeSantis, though, has been much more eager to focus on his resistance to Covid-19 restrictions, past and present, than to make a robust case for vaccination and booster shots.

Notably, at his rally on Saturday, Mr. Trump did not promote vaccines and criticized so-called Covid lockdowns.

Mr. Trumps loudest antagonists are likely to continue to stoke the tension between the two men. Ann Coulter, the conservative commentator who has fallen out with the former president, delighted in the dust-up this week.

Trump is demanding to know Ron DeSantiss booster status, and I can now reveal it, Ms. Coulter wrote on Twitter. He was a loyal booster when Trump ran in 2016, but then he learned our president was a liar and con man whose grift was permanent.

In an email, Ms. Coulter, herself a part-time Florida resident, put a finer point on what makes Mr. DeSantiss rise unsettling for the former president. Trump is done, she wrote. You guys should stop obsessing over him.

Jeremy W. Peters contributed reporting.

Read more from the original source:

Who Is King of Florida? Tensions Rise Between Trump and Ron DeSantis - The New York Times

Lane Cuthbert, along with his UMass colleague Alex Theodoridis, asked in an op-ed in The Washington Post:

How could the Big Lie campaign convince so many Republicans that Trump won an election he so clearly lost? Some observers wonder whether these beliefs are genuine or just an example of expressive responding, a term social scientists use to mean respondents are using a survey item to register a feeling rather than express a real belief.

In their own analysis of poll data, Cuthbert and Theodoridis concluded that most Republicans are true believers in Trumps lie:

Apparently, Republicans are reporting a genuine belief that Bidens election was illegitimate. If anything, a few Republicans may, for social desirability reasons, be using the Im not sure option to hide their true belief that the election was stolen.

Al-Gharbi sharply disputes this conclusion:

Most Republican voters likely dont believe in the Big Lie. But many would nonetheless profess to believe it in polls and surveys, and would support politicians who make similar professions, because these professions serve as a sign of defiance against the prevailing elites, they serve as signs of group solidarity and commitment.

Poll respondents, he continued,

often give the factually wrong answer about empirical matters, not because they dont know the empirically correct answer, but because they dont want to give political fodder to their opponents with respect to their preferred policies. And when one takes down the temperature on these political stakes, again, often the differences on the facts also disappear.

One way to test how much people actually believe something, al-Gharbi wrote, is to look out for yawning gaps between rhetoric and behaviors. The fact that roughly 2,500 people participated in the Jan. 6 insurrection suggests that the overwhelming majority of Republicans do not believe the election was stolen no matter what they tell pollsters, in al-Gharbis view:

If huge shares of the country, 68 percent of G.O.P. voters, plus fair numbers of Independents and nonvoters, literally believed that we were in a moment of existential crisis, and the election had been stolen, and the future was at stake why is it that only a couple thousand could muster the enthusiasm to show up and protest at the Capitol? In a world where 74 million voted for Trump, and more than two-thirds of these (i.e. more than 50 million people, roughly 1 out of every 5 adults in the U.S.) actually believed that the other party had illegally seized power and plan to use that power to harm people like themselves, the events of Jan. 6 would likely have played out much, much differently.

Whatever the motivation, Isabel V. Sawhill, a Brookings senior fellow, warned that Republican leaders and voters could be caught in a vicious cycle:

There may be a dynamic at work here in which an opportunistic strategy to please the Trump base has solidified that base, making it all the more difficult to take a stance in opposition to whatever-Trump-wants. Its a Catch-22. To change the direction of the country requires staying in power but staying in power requires satisfying a public, a large share of whom has lost faith in our institutions, including the mainstream media and the democratic process.

Jake Grumbach, a political scientist at the University of Washington, noted in an email that the big lie fits into a larger Republican strategy: In an economically unequal society, it is important for the conservative economic party to use culture war politics to win elections because they are unlikely to win based on their economic agenda.

There are a number of reasons why some Republican elites who were once anti-Trump became loyal to Trump, Grumbach continued:

First is the threat of being primaried for failing to sufficiently oppose immigration or the Democratic Party, a process that ramped up first in the Gingrich era and then more so during the Tea Party era of the early 2010s. Second is that Republican elites who were once anti-Trump learned that the Republican-aligned network of interest groups and donors Fox News, titans of extractive and low wage industry, the NRA, evangelical organizations, etc. would mostly remain intact despite sometimes initially signaling that they would withhold campaign contributions or leave the coalition in opposition to Trump.

Frances Lee, a political scientist at Princeton, took a different tack, arguing that Republican members of Congress, especially those in the Senate, would like nothing better than to have the big lie excised from the contemporary political landscape:

I disagree with the premise that many senators buy into the big lie. Congressional Republicans stance toward the events of Jan. 6 is to move on beyond them. They do not spend time rebuking activists who question the 2020 outcome, but they also do not endorse such views, either. With rare exception, congressional Republicans do not give floor speeches questioning the 2020 elections. They do not demand hearings to investigate election fraud.

Instead, Lee argued, Many Republican voters still support and love Donald Trump, and Republican elected officials want to be able to continue to represent these voters in Washington. The bottom line, she continued, is that

Republican elected officials want and need to hold the Republican Party together. In the U.S. two-party system, they see the Republican Party as the only realistic vehicle for contesting Democrats control of political offices and for opposing the Biden agenda. They see a focus on the 2020 elections as a distraction from the most important issues of the present: fighting Democrats tax and spend initiatives and winning back Republican control of Congress in the 2022 midterms.

Paul Begala, a Democratic strategist, argues that

Trump lives by Machiavellis famous maxim that fear is a better foundation for loyalty than love. G.O.P. senators dont fear Trump personally; they fear his followers. Republican politicians are so cowed by Trumps supporters you can almost hear them moo.

Trumpism, Begala wrote in an email, is more of a cult of personality, which makes fealty to the Dear Leader even more important. How else do you explain 16 G.O.P. senators who voted to reauthorize the Voting Rights Act in 2006, all refusing to even allow it to be debated in 2022?

Begala compares Senator Mitch McConnells views of the Voting Rights Act in 2006 Americas history is a story of ever-increasing freedom, hope and opportunity for all. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 represents one of this countrys greatest steps forward in that story. Today I am pleased the Senate reaffirmed that our country must continue its progress towards becoming a society in which every person, of every background, can realize the American dream to McConnells stance now: This is not a federal issue; it ought to be left to the states.

Republican politicians, in Begalas assessment,

have deluded themselves into thinking that Trump and the Big Lie can work for them. The reality is the opposite: Republican politicians work for Trump and the Big Lie. And they may be powerless to stop it if and when Trump uses it to undermine the 2024 presidential results.

It is at this point, Begala continued, where leadership matters. Trump stokes bigotry, he sows division, his promotes racism, and when other G.O.P. politicians fail to disavow Trumps divisiveness, they abet it. What a contrast to other Republican leaders in my lifetime.

Like Begala, Charles Stewart III, a political scientist at M.I.T., was blunt in his analysis:

Theres generally a lack of nuance in considering why Republican senators fail to abandon Trump. Whereas Reagan spoke of the 11th Commandment, Trump destroyed it, along with many of the first 10. He is mean and vindictive and speaks to a set of supporters who are willing to take their energy and animus to the polling place in the primaries or at least, thats the worry. They are also motivated by racial animus and by Christian millennialism.

These voters, according to Stewart,

are not a majority of the Republican Party, but they are motivated by fear, and fear is the greatest motivator. Even if a senator doesnt share those views and I dont think most do they feel they cant alienate these folks without stoking a fight. Why stoke a fight? Few politicians enter politics looking to be a martyr. Mainstream Republican senators may be overestimating their ability to keep the extremist genie in the bottle, but they have no choice right now, if they intend to continue in office.

Philip Bobbitt, a professor of law at Columbia and the University of Texas, argued in an email that Republican acceptance of Trumps falsehoods is a reflection of the power Trump has over members of the party:

Its the very fact that they know Trumps claims are ludicrous that is the point: like other bullies, he amuses himself and solidifies his authority by humiliating people and what can be more humiliating than compelling people to publicly announce their endorsements of something they know and everyone else knows to be false?

Thomas Mann, a Brookings senior fellow, made the case in an email that Trump has transformed the Republican Party so that membership now precludes having a moral sense: honesty, empathy, respect for ones colleagues, wisdom, institutional loyalty, a willingness to put country ahead of party on existential matters, an openness to changing conditions.

Instead, Mann wrote:

The current, Trump-led Republican Party allows no room for such considerations. Representative Liz Cheneys honest patriotism would be no more welcome among Senate Republicans than House Republicans. Even those current Republican senators whose earlier careers indicated a moral sense Mitt Romney, Susan Collins, Richard Burr, Roy Blunt, Lisa Murkowski, Robert Portman, Ben Sasse, Richard Shelby have felt obliged to pull their punches in the face of the Big Lie and attempted coup.

Bart Bonikowski, a sociologist at N.Y.U., describes the danger of this political dynamic:

In capturing the party, Trump perfectly embodied its ethnonationalist and authoritarian tendencies and delivered it concrete results even if his policy stances were not always perfectly aligned with party orthodoxy. As a result, the Republican Party and Trumpism have become fused into a single entity one that poses serious threats to the stability of the United States.

The unwillingness of Republican leaders to challenge Trumps relentless lies, for whatever reason for political survival, for mobilization of whites opposed to minorities, to curry favor, to feign populist sympathies is as or more consequential than actually believing the lie.

If Republican officials and their voters are willing to swallow an enormous and highly consequential untruth for political gain, they have taken a first step toward becoming willing allies in the corrupt manipulation of future elections.

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Opinion | Why Millions Think It Is Trump Who Cannot Tell a Lie - The New York Times

On Martin Luther King Jr. Dayamid the typical stories about marches, political speeches, and lawmakers and corporations that have no business quoting King doing so (and being called out for it)an impending Senate debate on voting protections loomed large in the news cycle, even as its outcome appeared preordained. Senators will today take up a pair of bills, both of which already passed in the House, that enjoy overwhelming support among Senate Democrats but will not pass a Republican filibuster unless Democrats move unanimously to sidestep it, something that senators Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin (them again) have said they wont do. In a bid to pressure recalcitrant politicians into reversing course, members of Kings family led a march and convened a news conference in Washington, DC, and also spoke to members of the media separately. The family cut through the usual lofty invocations to make a specific ask, Politicos Eugene Daniels writes: No celebration without legislation.

Its not just senators who are coming under increased scrutiny as the fight to preserve Americas democracy heats upthe political press is, too. The debate as to whether major news organizations are doing enough to communicate the threat and fight back against it isnt new, but seems to have taken on fresh urgency since the anniversary, two weeks ago, of the insurrectionand the reviews have, for the most part, been mixed at best, very bad at worst. Margaret Sullivan, a media critic at the Washington Post, concluded that while many individual journalists have contributed impressive coverage of the insurrection and ongoing Republican subversion, their employers are mostly not making democracy-under-siege a central focus of the work they present to the public as a strategic editorial priority; Sullivans colleague Perry Bacon Jr., argued, meanwhile, that many outlets are now defining democracy as a core coverage area, but added that this coverage isnt always sharply framed and that it could be even more prominent, particularly on widely watched local and national TV network newscasts. The press critic Dan Froomkin, for his part, was more scathing still: Top editors and reporters, he wrote, have effectively responded to columns like Sullivans and Bacons by giving us all the finger.

ICYMI: In France, an extraordinary musical interview sparks a debate on infotainment

Froomkin was referring, specifically, to coverage of last weeks congressional wrangling over the voting rights bills, arguing that political reporters largely framed them as they would any other partisan dogfightwithout any sense of urgency, without crucial context, and without even explaining whats in the bills in question. There have been other specific criticisms of this coverage, too. Greg Sargent and Paul Waldman, also of the Post, wrote that many reporters have come to accept unanimous Republican opposition to federal voting rights protections as a natural, unalterable, indelibly baked-in backstop condition of political life, and thus dont often bother to hold them accountable for it, instead obsessing over Democratic infighting; Jay Rosen, a journalism professor at New York University, cited this trend as evidence that the press continues to prize political savviness over integrity in public life, while Wesley Lowery observed that he knows in deep detail what Manchin/Sinemas issues with the bills are but cant say the same for the 50 GOP senators. And various observers pointed out, in a similar vein, that the impending failure of the bills has too often been viewed primarily through the lens of President Bidens political standing, holding him responsible for Republican obstructionism. Numerous prominent journalists fussed, for example, over Bidens divisive tone after he asked in a recent speech whether senators are on the side of King or segregationists like George Wallace.

In addition to such criticism, observers have offered suggestions as to how the press as a whole might cover threats to democracy better. Rosen and others have long called for news organizations to overtly state their institutional commitment to democracy; Sullivan argued, in her recent column, that outlets should consider putting their coverage of election subversion outside their paywalls, while also emphasizing the stories of people who are fighting to reinvigorate democratic processes. Some outlets are trying to do that themselves: noting recently that media navel-gazingrarely results in productive reform, Tony Marcano, the managing editor of KPCC and LAist in Southern California, explained how his newsroom is working to refocus its politics coverage, rebranding the beat as Civics and Democracy and instructing reporters to move beyond electoral horse races and partisan talking points to examine who gets listened to, and why, and provide a guide to anyone who wants to more fully participate in civic life. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, meanwhile, explained that it is taking a citizens agenda approach to a local mayoral election, asking voters what issues they want candidates to address.

We cant just sit back and wait for the national news organizations based in Washington and New York to shift their focus, Marcano wrote of the reset at KPCC/LAist. It has to start locally to drive home the relevance of the threat. Local newsrooms do indeed have a crucial role to play; they are in some ways the medias first line of defense here, since so much Republican election subversion involves local-level rules and offices, with adherents of the Big Lie running for previously obscure posts with direct oversight of vote counting and certification. But national newsrooms must urgently shift their focus, too. There has already been a lot of good national-level coverage of these local maneuvers, but whenever threats to democracy become a really dominant national story, the coverage is usually organized around national-level story lines: the insurrection and probe thereof, federal voting rights bills, what Biden is saying, and so on. These stories are urgent and, in the case of the bills at least, have a necessary local component, since the federal legislation is a response to state-level laws. But, as Froomkin notes, the local specifics have often been downplayed. More broadly, as Bacon notes, the traditional division of focus between national and local outlets simply doesnt work here. Republican operatives rely on quietly moving institutional chips into place below the level of the national spotlight. But they cant do this quietly if the national spotlight finds them.

The compelling criticisms outlined above are, to my mind, less about increasing the volume of democracy-subversion coveragewere seeing a lot of it at the moment, even if there could still be morethan a hard reset in the culture of much political journalism, which is a harder ask. One part of this, as Ive written many times here, is to stop muddying lines of accountability and to get away from covering politics as a game, as outlets like KPCC/LAist are trying to do. Another imperative is not only to inject more existential urgency across the board, but also to marshal it with greater care; well-placed, genuinely sharp explanatory scrutiny can often do more good than setting your hair on fire on cable news night after night. We also need to see democracy not as a beat or story, but as a principle undergirding all our coverage, since democracy itself is the principle undergirding public life. Its ridiculous, as Ive written before, to cover future elections as normal races when the rules are being warped. But my point here is broader. The climate crisis is a democracy story, as is social policy. Yet Bidens stalled legislation in these areas is often covered separately from his voting legislation; as competing, not complementary, priorities.

Over the long weekend, a Trump rally in Arizona loomed in the news cycle. Thankfully, it didnt achieve the saturation-level coverage of Trump rallies pasteven Fox didnt carry it livebut it nonetheless sparked no little content and punditry. The bulk of this, that I saw, centered on Trump himself, but as Waldman points out in the Post, the much bigger story out of the event should have been the parade of Arizona politicians who came to pay tribute to him, including Kari Lake, a TV anchor turned Big Liespewing gubernatorial candidate, and Mark Finchem, a QAnon-adjacent conspiracy theorist who was in DC on January 6 and now wants to oversee Arizonas elections as a Trump-endorsed candidate for secretary of state. As Waldman notes, you probably havent heard of Finchem, but it is almost impossible to exaggerate what a fanatic he is. If Lake, Finchem, or anyone else of their ilk gets elected in Novemberand thats the first your readers are hearing of themyoure probably doing something wrong.

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Podcast: The Chicago ed beat

TOP IMAGE: Several hundred activists march in Washington on Jan. 17, 2022, a holiday honoring civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr., urging Senate action to pass a bill to protect voters from racial discrimination. (Kyodo via AP Images) ==Kyodo

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Covering the Republican assault on American democracy - Columbia Journalism Review

Nevertheless, Bundy dismissed McGeachins governor-for-a-day anti-mandate orders as a political gimmick. The only one they benefit is her. What would he have done in her place? I would have done what I did do, rally the people. I would have used the office of the lieutenant governor to unite the legislature to end the [governors] emergency order. As governor, he added, he would focus on downsizing the executive agencies and restoring power back to the legislature, where it belongs. But without appearing to see a contradiction, he said he would do so by executive fiat: I think I could spend four years doing that and not have to deal with the legislature at all.

In Idaho as elsewhere, Republicans tend to extol local control rather than high-handed state and federal directives. But that principle tends to hold only as long as local governments do what conservatives want. Boise, for example, elected its city councilmembers at large, which reinforced its Democratic-leaning majority. So in 2020 Republican legislators passed a law ordering all cities with more than 100,000 residents which then meant only Boise to hold district elections, in hopes of capturing some seats. This may have unintended consequences: Two Republican-dominated cities in the Treasure Valley, Meridian and Nampa, have since passed the 100,000 threshold.

Bundy, however, leapfrogs over this contradiction. When I asked him if local control meant school boards and cities should be free to adopt Covid restrictions, he responded in classic libertarian fashion: The primary local control is the individual, over his own life and body. ... Theres no role of a city to come in and say, you cant come out of your homes unless you wear a mask.

Still, theres something inconsistent about his Keep Idaho Idaho slogan. He proposes to restore the original Idaho, to rescue it from the likes of third-generation Idahoan rancher Brad Little. But Bundy himself only moved to Idaho six-and-a-half years ago; he grew up on his fathers ranch in Nevada, then lived in Phoenix. The city had grown up around us there, he explained. I just didnt want to raise my children in the city. He and his wife visited state after state seeking a new home that, as he put it, still believes in freedom. But, he laments, the whole West is changing. I grew up in Nevada. I never thought it would be predominant Democrat. Even Utah has its struggle right now. Its converting over. In Salt Lake theres a gay mayor. Which is fine, but

When the Bundys reached Emmett, they knew it was the place we needed to be. Idaho is a beautiful land, but its also a beautiful idea. ... Idaho is basically what the United States was.

No one seems to expect him to win the primary; according to one political operative, an unreleased Republican poll showed him with single-digit support, McGeachin in the low 20s (pre-Trump endorsement) and Little above 60 percent. Bundys brother Ryan, running as an independent for governor of Nevada in 2018, won just 2 percent of that vote.

Even if Bundy were somehow nominated, he might not get help from the party. Weve got to unite around whoever wins the nomination, Luna told me. Even if its Bundy? Lunas expression darkened. Hes not a Republican.

Hes right, Im not the Republican they are, that is for danged sure, Bundy responded. I never will be. Im going to give the people of Idaho a decision are you Republican or are you conservative? Cause theyre not the same thing, especially in Idaho right now.

Newcomer that he is, Bundy represents a demographic trend that is transforming politics and life in the Gem State. Call it right flight. From the 1950s through the 1980s, California was what would now be called a purple state; it elected Republican governors half the time and voted R in nearly every presidential race. Since then, California has turned deep blue; Republicans loss there has been red Idahos gain. Fueled by migration from California and, to a lesser extent, Washington and Oregon, Idahos population has soared since 2015, rising faster than any other states.

This growth has been concentrated in Boise and the sprawling, conservative suburbs and exurbs west of it places such as Star, population 11,000, roughly twice what it was 10 years ago, and Meridian, the states second-largest city, which grew 1,157 percent, from fewer than 10,000 to nearly 120,000 residents, between 1990 and 2020. Population has also surged in the far northern Panhandle, which stretches up to the Canadian border. In the heyday of unionized mining and timber industries, the north was the states most Democratic region. Now its an incubator of armed militias and fiercely ideological local politics and the center of the decade-old Redoubt Movement, which promotes the Inland Northwest as a conservative Christian refuge.

Republican migrants to Idaho outnumber Democrats about two-to-one, according to a statewide annual survey of public attitudes conducted at Boise State University. Rather than importing the liberal politics of the coastal cities theyve left, many bring smoldering resentment of government regulation and socialism. They want to make sure people here know how evil liberals are, says Alicia Abbott, a political independent in Sandpoint, the largest town in far-northern Bonner County. Shes doing voter outreach for 97 Percent, an effort to counter the Three Percenters armed extremism.

Those who fear and those who cheer the effects of right flight agree on one point: The newcomers are pushing Idaho politics farther to the right. Like Bundy, they bring a converts zeal for the hallowed rugged individualism of their new home. New to Idaho, true to Idaho, proclaims the influential Idaho Freedom Foundation, which vets legislation and legislators for their conservative correctness. Are you a refugee from California, or some other liberal playground? Did you move to Idaho to escape the craziness? its website says. Welcome to Idaho.

A thriving local preparedness real estate industry is cashing in on right flight. One broker, Todd Savage of the PATRIOTS ONLY real estate firm Black Rifle Real Estate and a self-proclaimed conservative libertarian refugee from San Francisco, had to revise a listing that read, This property is for sale to Liberty / Constitutional Buyers ONLY because the Multiple Listing Service thought it suggested bias against immigrants. No big deal, Savage told me: Business is fantastic! This whole pandemic thing has really fueled land ownership in rural areas. A lot of my clients are in police, fire, and medical fields. They are coming here in droves. They dont care about real estate prices. They have money to burn.

Luna likewise speaks of sending out the political welcome wagon to these new Idahoans, to make sure they dont get the wrong idea about Republicans: We want to make sure the first time they hear about the Idaho Republican Party, its from one of our volunteers, not on TV or in the newspapers.

The question is, which Republican Party? The power centers in Boise and the Panhandle are not moving in step. The rift opened publicly in July when the Kootenai County Republican Central Committee unanimously passed an effusive resolution endorsing the John Birch Society and urged the state party to adopt it too. (It refused.) The Kootenai resolution also urged those who do not support our party platform to follow the example of Bill Brooks, and voluntarily disaffiliate from the Idaho Republican Party. Brooks, a Kootenai County commissioner, quit the party to protest its cozying up to the Birchers, though he still considers himself a staunch conservative. He sees it as symptomatic of a broader shift: We came here 20 years ago because it was the closest thing we could find to Norman Rockwell, he told me. Now people come looking for George Lincoln Rockwell the founder of the American Nazi Party.

Candidate lawn signs dot the side of the road. | Eric Scigliano

The newcomers may denounce the cities theyve left, but they bring a combative, impatient post-urban edge to once-mellow Idaho, an impatience that shows in politics as in the increasingly congested traffic in Idahos fast-growing cities.

Chris Fillios, who serves with Brooks on the Kootenai County Commission, feels the heat. Unlike Brooks, hes stayed in the Republican Party, even though he says hes been called communist, Marxist, socialist. Its not his politics that have changed, suggests Fillios, whos lived in Idaho for 21 years and spoke at the first local Tea Party rally. Its the party. Its a psychological mass movement. People are coming here for freedom, thinking, I dont have to mask, I dont have to be nice.

Most people dont understand that we control only the county departments budgets, he continued. They think were legislators. They want to know where we stand on gun rights and abortion. They want us to reflect their values.

Fillios succinctly summed up his partys paradoxical predicament: Weve become so politicized with this single-party dominance.

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Why Theres a Civil War in Idaho Inside the GOP - POLITICO

It seemed that Joe Biden would be bad for business in Make America great again world.

In theory, the US president, a white man with working-class roots and moderate policy positions, was a more elusive target for Donald Trumps increasingly extreme support base than other prominent Democrats.

But after his first year in office, it transpires that Biden is not too boring to be a rightwing boogeyman after all.

Hes our best salesperson, said Ronald Solomon, a merchandiser who sells a $21.99 T-shirt depicting the president with an Adolf Hitler-style mustache and the slogan Not My Dictator. Sales for Trump stuff and anti-Biden merchandise is the highest its been except for the three months leading up to the 2020 election.

The demonization of Biden as a Hitler, Stalin or anti-white racist bears no relation to reality. But for many Republican voters it appears to stick, the product of relentless conservative media attacks, the presidents own missteps, and seething frustration during a seemingly never-ending pandemic.

At first Biden did excite less animus than Barack Obama, the first Black president who was subjected to conspiracy theories about his birthplace and the rise of the populist Tea Party movement. Biden never had to go through the misogyny endured by Hillary Clinton.

His policy record was also non-incendiary. When Trump supporters gathered at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference under the banner America vs socialism, the biggest hate figures were Senator Bernie Sanders, a democratic socialist from Vermont, and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a liberal Latina from New York.

Since moving into the White House, however, Biden has granted Sanders a prominent voice in shaping his policy agenda. The unexpected scale of the presidents ambition to spend trillions of dollars on coronavirus relief, the social safety net and the climate crisis has fed into a Republican narrative that he is a puppet of the radical left.

And although Bidens identity as a white man neutralised other isms, he cannot escape ageism. At 79, he is the oldest American president in history, his every verbal slip seized upon as cause to doubt his mental fitness. Last May, Fox News host Sean Hannity displayed a sippy cup with the presidential seal on it, floating the nickname Sippy Cup Joe.

In August, Tucker Carlson told viewers of the same network: Maybe the most important thing weve learned is that Joe Biden is not capable of running the country. Joe Biden is senile. (Such commentators rarely note that Mitch McConnell, Republican minority leader in the Senate, is also 79.)

Another popular line of attack is to compare Biden to Jimmy Carter, whose presidency in the 1970s ended in failure after one term. Joe Biden Is Jimmy Carter 2.0, said one such press release from the Republican National Committee. On Joe Bidens watch, America is grappling with a gas crisis, record-breaking inflation, weak leadership abroad, and Americans trapped behind enemy lines, all reminiscent of the Jimmy Carter years.

But there is no greater symbol of anti-Biden sentiment than Lets go Brandon, a phrase that originated at a Nascar race in Alabama in October. Brandon Brown, a 28-year-old driver, had won his first Xfinity Series and was being interviewed by an NBC Sports reporter.

The crowd behind him was chanting something that at first was hard to hear. The reporter suggested they were saying Lets go, Brandon! to support the driver. But it became increasingly clear they were chanting, Fuck Joe Biden! So it was that Lets go, Brandon became conservative code for insulting the president and went viral.

On a Southwest flight from Houston to Albuquerque, the pilot signed off his greeting over the public address system with the phrase, leaving some passengers aghast. On Christmas Eve, when Biden fielded a few phone calls to the Norad Santa Tracker, Jared Schmeck, a Trump supporter from Oregon, said: Merry Christmas and lets go, Brandon!

Speaking from Las Vegas, Solomon, president of the Maga Mall, said he has a line of Lets go, Brandon merchandise including banners, buttons, T-shirts for men and women and hats in four different colors. One, its an attack on the mainstream media: this gal from NBC Sports immediately tried to make it like they were saying something that they werent, he explained.

Two, its a way for Republicans that dont want to use a four-letter word to have a chance to say something that attacks the president of the United States, who they cant stand any more.

In a nod to the Trump base, Republican senator Ted Cruz posed with a Lets go, Brandon sign at baseballs World Series. McConnells press secretary retweeted a photo of the phrase on a construction sign in Virginia. Congressman Jeff Duncan of South Carolina wore a Lets go, Brandon face mask at the US Capitol. Jim Lamon, a Senate candidate from Arizona, used the slogan a TV campaign ad.

Critics point out that goading, provoking and outraging their opponents, known as owning the libs, has become the defining principle of a Republican party that lacks a coherent ideology of its own. McConnell reportedly told donors last month that he would not be putting forward a legislative agenda for Novembers midterm elections because he was content to merely hammer away at Democrats.

But with Bidens approval rating hovering in the low 40s, and his Build Back Better agenda stalled in Congress, the Republican formula might be working.

John Zogby, a pollster and author, said: They have made significant inroads into demonizing him. In the beginning, of course, it was hard. He was a softer target, he was Uncle Joe, he had a high favorability rating and hed been around a long time.

But definitely in the second half of this first year, the almost-mantras of the Republican party have gained hold: hes too old, hes a socialist, and then this whole Lets go, Brandon thing. Plus the fact that theyve been able to successfully block the bigger initiatives so not only a socialist, but a socialist who cant succeed, is the message.

Barbs and brickbats aimed at a Democratic president are hardly new. Before Obama there was Bill Clinton, who drew his share of rancor, vitriol and baseless conspiracy theories. In todays hyper-polarized Washington, inflamed by social media, the incumbent can expect to have everything but the kitchen sink thrown at them.

Allan Lichtman, a distinguished history professor at American University in Washington, said: As long as you have the capital D as your political designation, you are a target for the Republicans. It doesnt matter if you are a leftwing or moderate Democrat it makes absolutely no difference.

Bill Clinton was a centrist. He was the head of the Democratic Leadership Council, dedicated to moving the Democrats to the centre, and yet they relentlessly attacked him, even impeached him. Republicans will oppose essentially anything that a Democratic president proposes and relentlessly attack them.

Others argue that Biden has done Republicans work for them with a botched Afghanistan withdrawal, a crisis at the southern border, the highest inflation for 40 years and an inability to curb the pandemic. The presidents newly aggressive stance on voting rights and safeguarding democracy has also rallied Republicans against him.

Frank Luntz, a Republican pollster and strategist, said: Incredibly, Joe Biden has a worse approval rating at this point than Donald Trump did and its not because of Republican critiques. Its because of Bidens failures.

Hes failed to communicate effectively. Hes failed to try to bridge the gap; in fact, hes been promoting greater division. Hes promised too much on Covid and hasnt delivered. And nothing bothers people more than rising prices because that affects everyone, whether you are working class, middle class or somewhat affluent.

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Attack, attack, attack: Republicans drive to make Biden the bogeyman - The Guardian