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For Trump, Racism Is an Election Strategy. For the Republican Right, It’s a Path to Power.
Most Republican leaders sat in shameful silence after President Trump told four women of color in the House of Representatives—three of them born in the U.S—to “go back” to the “crime infested” countries they came from. When called on his racist rhetoric, Trump doubled down and dialed up the volume, accusing these elected officials of hating America and again inviting them and anyone else like them to leave. His followers picked up on his cue, chanting “send her back” after Trump slammed Rep. Ilhan Omar at a political rally.
Trump’s racist rants and policy pronouncements aren’t just a glimpse into his id; they’re part of a strategy for inflaming his supporters against perceived threats from “the other”—people of color, immigrants, Muslims, LGBTQ people and “socialists”—in order to win elections. And for the right-wing political machine that has embraced him, that’s the key to their real endgame, which is to maintain and increase the access to power that they’ve gained since Trump came into office. That power is apparent in Trump’s massive tax cut for the wealthy, in the administration’s aggressive moves to overturn regulations that protect individuals, communities, and the environment, and in the judges they hope will gut the federal government’s constitutional authority to act on behalf of the common good.
This is not to say that Trump’s racism is not heartfelt. Decades of evidence suggest that it is. But Trump also apparently believes that his campaign tirades against immigrants put him in the White House. And he has clearly decided that he can win re-election by fully embracing that strategy. That’s why his administration has embraced cruelty as official policy, even to the point of stealing babies from their parents—and perpetuating conditions that are traumatizing and, yes, killing children.
For Trump, it’s a playbook for winning. For those who see themselves as pious or otherwise respectable Republicans, what could be worth all the horror and humiliation?
Power.
Groups from every corner of the conservative movement are enjoying the fulfillment of long-held wish lists, which is why right-wing leaders—including Trump’s evangelical cheerleaders—will do anything for him, and tolerate or actually cheer anything he says or does, no matter how base or cruel.
Recall that when Trump jumped into the presidential race, it wasn’t as a movement conservative. His candidacy was an ego-stroking power trip that followed the demagogic path cleared by right-wing authors, radio hosts and TV pundits who had primed millions of Americans to resent “illegal aliens” and “political correctness” and not to trust the “liberal media.”
Trump likes to believe he’s the genius who created the conditions for his own victory. It’s true that he brought the strongman bombast his followers love, but the conditions for his success were created by a massive infrastructure of think tanks, media outlets, and political organizations funded for decades by right-wing foundations and wealthy conservatives. Alongside and overlapping that movement is the Religious Right, which spent decades building its own infrastructure and effectively taking over the Republican Party from the bottom up.
Trump’s advisers know where power resides in today’s GOP. When Trump picked Mike Pence as his running mate, he simultaneously signaled the two most important Republican power blocs that had previously been suspicious of him—Religious Right leaders and the Koch brothers’ political networks. And when Trump pledged to turn over the selection of Supreme Court justices to the Federalist Society and Heritage Foundation, he won allegiance both from activists eager to ban abortion and reverse progress toward LGBTQ equality—and from those eager to further weaken the power of unions and reverse decades of progressive regulation and court rulings.
Which is how we got to where we are today, when white evangelical Christians are the most unapologetic and unquestioningly loyal defenders of the “anointed” Trump, no matter what he says or does or who he hurts. In return, they’re getting the Supreme Court of their dreams and an executive branch that is advancing its anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQ policy agendas.
And when Mick Mulvaney, elected to Congress in the 2010 Tea Party wave, is using his power as White House chief of staff to push executive branch agencies to more aggressively reverse regulations that might inconvenience corporations. One advantage of authoritarian governments for those on the inside has always been the power to plunder.
Then there’s the assault on the judiciary. The harmful judges that Trump and Mitch McConnell are putting in lifetime positions on the federal courts are being counted on by his supporters not only to reverse Roe v. Wade and marriage equality and landmark decisions upholding separation of church and state, but also dismantle the administrative state and undo the New Deal and Great Society programs by returning us to a 19th century state-rights-focused interpretation of the Constitution that would drastically restrict the authority of the federal government to regulate corporate behavior.
Trump’s personal goals for his presidency may focus on self-aggrandizement, self-enrichment, and reversing any step taken by the Obama administration. But the right-wing movement’s more audacious goal—to reverse much of the legal and social progress of the past century—depends on keeping Trump in the White House and continuing to pack the courts with judges chosen for their youth as well as their ideology so as to extend Trump’s influence for decades beyond his time in the White House.
Republican leaders and prominent conservatives have apparently made the shameful and cynical calculation that the goal of achieving their turn-back-the-clock agenda is so worthwhile that if achieving it requires creating a brutal humanitarian catastrophe, or undermining constitutional checks and balances, or poisoning our political culture with racist and nativist rhetoric that energizes violent bigots and white nationalists, so be it.
This article was originally published at Right Wing Watch and is republished here by permission.
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Former Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said on Monday that she is “done supporting” her former party—but don’t expect her to join the Democratic party anytime soon.
Greene announced her disillusionment with the GOP on Monday afternoon in a tweet.
“Tucker is not the only one who is done supporting the Republican Party. There is A LOT of us that are absolutely fed up and will not support a party that betrays its voters and country. That does not mean we are turning into Democrats either. But we are DONE with the America LAST Republican Party,” Greene wrote.
Tucker is not the only one who is done supporting the Republican Party.
There is A LOT of us that are absolutely fed up and will not support a party that betrays its voters and country.
That does not mean we are turning into Democrats either.
But we are DONE with the America…
— Marjorie Taylor Greene 🇺🇸 (@mtgreenee) June 22, 2026
She referred to comments made last week by pundit Tucker Carlson. Carlson appeared on the Can’t Be Censored podcast Thursday, saying he would refrain from supporting either major party, and admitted “I’m not sure what I’m going to do.”
READ MORE: ‘Gaslight America’: Marjorie Taylor Greene Blasts Trump Ahead of His Trip to Georgia
“How could I or any American voter support a political party that’s not loyal to the United States. That puts the interests of a foreign country above those of its own citizens. It’s not possible to vote for people like that, and I’m not going to,” Carlson said, according to Mediaite, referring to America’s long-time ally Israel.
Greene famously broke with President Donald Trump earlier this year when she called for the release of the FBI files relating to disgraced financier and sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein. A former staunch ally of Trump, the two started trading barbs. Greene resigned from the House this January. Greene has long called for an isolationist foreign policy, criticizing America’s involvement in Ukraine as well as the current conflict with Iran.
Given that Greene said she has no plans on moving leftward in her politics, it’s unclear if she will refrain from voting or if she’ll throw her lot in with a third party. While American politics are primarily driven by the two major parties, a number of smaller parties also exist.
Greene may find a home in the Libertarian party, the third-largest party by voter registration. The Libertarian party has drifted rightward since its founding in 1971. While initially economically conservative but politically liberal, after 2022, the paleolibertarian Mises Caucus gained control of the party. Paleolibertarianism was developed by anarcho-capitalists, and embraces cultural conservatism. Some of the most widely known paleolibertarians include former Representative Ron Paul and the current president of Argentina, Javier Milei.
Third parties struggle to gain traction in the United States. The closest a third party has come to widespread support was the Reform Party, founded by H. Ross Perot during the 1996 presidential election after he won 18.9% of the popular vote in the 1992 presidential election as an independent candidate. Reform won 8.4% of the popular vote in the 1996 election, but no third-party or independent candidate has been as successful as Perot since.
However, the electoral college makes it difficult for a third-party presidential candidate to be elected at all. Third-party presidential candidates are often seen as spoilers for the major candidates. Perot is often believed to have won votes away from President George H.W. Bush in 1992, giving the election to President Bill Clinton. In 2000, Green Party candidate Ralph Nader was similarly accused of acting as a spoiler for Vice President Al Gore, leading to the election of President George W. Bush.
Third parties, however, have a better track record in down-ballot races. For example, Kshama Sawant won election to the Seattle City Council in 2014 as a member of the Socialist Alternative party. She held office until 2024, when she declined to seek reelection. She is currently running for a seat in the House of Representatives as an independent.
Image via Shutterstock
President Donald Trump announced on Monday that Iran “will agree” to allow weapon inspectors into the country in a slightly confusing social media post.
“Everybody is fully aware that Iran will agree to have Major Weapons Inspections in order to ensure ‘Nuclear Honesty’ long into the future,” the president wrote on his social media platform Truth Social.
Vice President JD Vance has been handling the negotiations with Iran to end the military conflict started by the United States and Israel at the end of February. Vance said earlier today that inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency would be allowed to enter Iran. The inspectors could be in the country as soon as Monday, according to the Washington Post.
READ MORE: Large Majority of Americans Say Iran Conflict Should End, Hasn’t Met Any of Trump’s Goals
Trump’s wording, however, is somewhat hard to parse. When he says “everyone is fully aware,” is Trump referring to Vance’s Monday announcement that had been widely reported? Or is Trump attempting to cast doubt, suggesting Iran may somehow be pulling a fast one, allowing inspections to provide cover for a weapons program?
Either way, the allowing of weapons inspectors into Iran is similar to what former President Barack Obama’s administration negotiated for in 2015. The Obama-era deal called for IAEA inspectors to make sure Iran was complying with the deal, and was not developing nuclear weapons. But in 2018, after Trump ended the agreement, Iran started to block IAEA inspectors from parts of their nuclear program. Since then, IAEA inspectors do not know the status of Iran’s enriched uranium, according to the Washington Post.
One year ago from Monday, the U.S. struck Iranian sites believed to hold stockpiles of enriched uranium. Since then, Trump has claimed that the strike “completely and totally obliterated” the country’s nuclear enrichment facilities, however, this has never been verified. Even at the time, the Pentagon said that Iran’s nuclear program had only been “degraded…by two years.” Trump’s national intelligence director testified prior to the strike that there was no evidence that Iran’s existing nuclear program was meant to build weapons, according to the Military Times.
Iran has long promised not to build or obtain nuclear weapons. In 1970, Iran signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty which deemed the country a non-nuclear state.
While Trump has warned that Iran could have a nuclear bomb “within six months,” the first report from the International Atomic Energy Agency since the Iran conflict started says that there has been no major change to the country’s nuclear program, according to Reuters.
Image via Reuters
Six grand jury subpoenas were quashed by a federal judge Wednesday, when it was decided that the subpoenas were filed to retaliate against Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz’s administration and the city governments of Minneapolis and St. Paul.
Chief Judge Patrick J. Schiltz of the District of Minnesota made his ruling public on Monday, granting the motion requested by the Minnesota officials to quash grand jury subpoenas related to Minnesota declaring itself to be a “sanctuary” state.
Last December, the Department of Homeland Security deployed over 3,000 agents to Minnesota as part of the largest immigration-related operation in the department’s history, Operation Metro Surge. After the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by DHS agents, the state of Minnesota as well as the twin cities challenged Operation Metro Surge in court, prompting President Donald Trump to rail against the local officials on social media.
READ MORE: Trump Dangles Another Insurrection Act Threat for Minnesota
Days after Minnesota, Minneapolis and St. Paul filed suit, news reports revealed that the Department of Justice had begun to investigate Walz and Minnesota Mayor Jacob Frey. Trump administration officials said that by not supporting the actions of DHS, Walz and Frey were breaking the law.
The Minnesotan officials argued that the subpoenas were “issued as part of an unconstitutional effort to coerce” them into working with DHS and ICE.
Judge Schiltz found that though grand juries traditionally “have broad investigatory powers,” the subpoenas had exceeded those powers. Schiltz agreed that the subpoenas were in violation of the Tenth Amendment, allowing states some degree of autonomy from the federal government.
Schiltz wrote that he had “no doubt” the subpoenas were issued for the “forbidden purposes” of attempting to “harass” or “coerce” Walz and Frey “into taking official action…. a blatantly unlawful and unethical use the grand-jury process.”
“On the one hand, the evidence that the challenged subpoenas were issued for unlawful reasons is overwhelming. On the other hand, the Department has struggled-without success-to identify a single plausible investigatory justification for the subpoenas,” Schiltz wrote, pointing out that the “public record… is replete with direct evidence of the Trump administration—including the highest-ranking officials of the Department—threatening and attempting to punish states and localities that have adopted ‘sanctuary’ policies.”
“To be clear, the Court agrees with the Department that a grand-jury subpoena need not be supported by probable cause. At the same time, a grand-jury subpoena cannot be issued for an improper purpose. The fact that connections between the information sought in the subpoenas and any possible criminal violation range from extremely weak to nonexistent only adds to the overwhelming evidence that these subpoenas were not issued to investigate, but to harass, coerce, and retaliate,” Schiltz added.
Image via Shutterstock
Marjorie Taylor Greene Says She’s ‘Done Supporting’ The GOP: ‘Party Betrays Its Voters’
Donald Trump Says Iran ‘Will Agree to Major Weapons Inspections’ to Ensure ‘Nuclear Honesty’
Federal Judge Quashes ‘Retaliatory’ Subpoenas Against Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz
GOP Rep Demands Biden’s Pardons to Be ‘Declared Null and Void’
Large Majority of Americans Say Iran Conflict Should End, Hasn’t Met Any of Trump’s Goals
News1 day agoMarjorie Taylor Greene Says She’s ‘Done Supporting’ The GOP: ‘Party Betrays Its Voters’
IDIOCY1 day agoGOP Rep Demands Biden’s Pardons to Be ‘Declared Null and Void’
News1 day agoFederal Judge Quashes ‘Retaliatory’ Subpoenas Against Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz
BAD PRESIDENT2 days agoLarge Majority of Americans Say Iran Conflict Should End, Hasn’t Met Any of Trump’s Goals
News1 day agoDonald Trump Says Iran ‘Will Agree to Major Weapons Inspections’ to Ensure ‘Nuclear Honesty’
