Heather Cox Richardson

So you're an elected Republican.

You're in the middle between those two things.

And right now they are continuing to try, I think, and cover for Trump at the same time recognizing that they're losing their base.

And so there is pressure building up in that party.

Some people are going full Nazi and you're seeing a big split in MAGA with those who are following Trump.

Stephen Miller and J.D.

Vance and Curtis Yarvin and those people into the essentially white nationalist neo-Nazi angle.

But that's enormously unpopular among the American people at large.

So then there are other people who are saying, well, let's just stop the voting.

Let's just take away the votes from the most people that we can.

And yet there are still some Republicans who are saying, I'd kind of like to be elected fairly, and I can't do it on any of the policies that you're talking about.

And I think you're seeing in the Republican Party kind of a mishmash of people choosing among those things, and you're starting to see some electives saying, hey, maybe we should at least nod to this.

So why are they doing it?

Why are they going along with him?

Many of them owe their election to him.

Many of them are afraid of their constituents.

Many of them don't know what else to do.

The Republican Party does not have a message right now that is saleable to anybody at all except essentially neo-Nazis.

So I think we're in a real period of ferment.

We've seen this before, of course, but which way the people in that party jump is going to have a huge impact in this moment on the world, simply because of the fact that Trump is now trying to dismantle the rules-based international order.