What Do They Stand For?
The GOP dumpster fire continues to burn like Canadian wildfires.
Wisconsin’s GOP controlled legislature, thanks to heavily gerrymandered districts, recently passed several bills relating to transgender kids which would ban gender affirming medical care and create artificial barriers to trans kids playing sports in their new gender. The bills were passed after legislators heard from medical experts and members of the trans community just how misguided and harmful they were. They passed the bills knowing that similar laws have been struck down by federal courts as unconstitutional. They passed the bills knowing that Governor Evers promised to veto them. In the face of so much concerted opposition, the only apparent reason those bills were passed was to pander to those who still believe in harming others just because they can.
The GOP controlled House of Representatives ousted their Speaker and rejected three potential candidates before finally electing a little-known hard liner, Mike Johnson, R-LA, on Wednesday, ending three weeks of legislative paralysis. Johnson supports the former president and worked to overturn the last presidential election. An Evangelical Christian, he opposes abortion, supports forced birth, and opposes same-sex marriage.
Before settling on Johnson, the GOP members of the house were deeply divided, and it remains to be seen if he can unify the various factions of his membership to keep the government functioning and supporting efforts to support Israel and Ukraine. In choosing Johnson, the MAGA forces now are in complete control of the House. Part of the Speaker’s job is to negotiate with the leaders in the Senate and the White House. His extreme views will make those discussions very difficult indeed.
The former president’s legal problems continue to mount. The criminal conspiracy case in Georgia should scare him the most. Three of his lawyers and one other co-defendant in the case have already flipped and become witnesses for the prosecution. Their reversals will prompt other defendants in the case to pursue their own deals with the prosecution in exchange for their testimony against those who remain. I expect that the former president and his main lawyer, Rudy Guliani, will be the last ones standing when they go on trial next year.
The former president’s Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, has agreed to cooperate with the government against his former boss in the Federal election interference case in Washington, D.C. Meadows knows where all the bodies are buried and will prove to be a devastating witness for the prosecution.
The civil fraud trial in New York proceeds as witness upon witness paint a picture of the con and fraud that permeated the former president’s businesses in that state. Michael Cohen and Alan Weisselberg, both testified that they cooked the books to inflate the values of certain assets enabling their boss to obtain more favorable terms from banks. The former president has now been fined twice for violating the gag order imposed by the judge in that case to protect witnesses and court staff.
In Colorado, another trial is set to begin next Monday to determine if the Secretary of State there can keep the former president off that state’s ballot next year. The issue there is whether he can be disqualified from running under Article Three of the 14th Amendment because of his role in fomenting the insurrection at the nation’s capitol on January 6th. Similar cases have been brought or are under consideration in several other states. Should Colorado keep him off the ballot, other states will surely follow.
How the GOP plans to find a path to win the 2024 elections for Congress and the White House is a complete mystery. We are weary from the divisiveness and ineptitude of those in charge of the Republican Party. They have no policy grounded platform to help Americans grow and fix the problems we all face. Being against everything Democrats stand for tells us nothing about what they might try to accomplish if they prevail, except the destruction of the national safety net and the persecution of those they do not like.
It is long past time to send the MAGA folks home from the halls of our government.
Waring Fincke is a retired attorney and former guardian who lives in the Village of Kewaskum.
