{"id":14167,"date":"2022-12-05T06:59:12","date_gmt":"2022-12-05T14:59:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/?p=14167"},"modified":"2022-12-05T07:01:22","modified_gmt":"2022-12-05T15:01:22","slug":"trumps-call-to-terminate-the-constitution-is-a-fantasy-but-its-still-dangerous-cnn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/?p=14167","title":{"rendered":"“”Trump\u2019s call to terminate the Constitution is a fantasy, but it\u2019s still dangerous”, CNN"},"content":{"rendered":"

Analysis by Stephen Collinson<\/span>, CNN, Mon December 5, 2022<\/p>\n

Donald Trump\u2019s<\/a> call for the termination of the Constitution<\/a> is his most extreme anti-democratic statement yet and seems oblivious to the sentiments of voters who rejected election deniers<\/a> in the midterm elections.<\/p>\n

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Former President Donald Trump announces his 2024 White House bid at Mar-a-Lago on November 15, 2022, in Palm Beach, Florida. <\/span><\/div>\n

Joe Raedle\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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It may also reflect desperation on the part of the former president to whip up controversy and fury among his core supporters in order to inject some energy into a so-far lackluster 2024 White House bid.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s comments<\/a> on his Truth Social network \u2013 which should be easy for anyone to condemn \u2013 are exposing the familiar moral timidity<\/a> of top Republicans who won\u2019t disown the former president. But his latest tirade also plays into the arguments of some Republicans now saying that it\u2019s time to move on from Trump\u2019s fixation with the 2020 election.<\/p>\n

And while it is far too early to write off his chances in the 2024 GOP nominating contest, Trump\u2019s behavior since announcing his third presidential bid also suggests his never-ending quest to shock and to fire up his base now means going so far right he ends up on the extremist fringe and almost in self-parody. In the short time he\u2019s been a candidate, he\u2019s expressed support for rioters<\/a> who stormed the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, and dined with a White nationalist Holocaust denier<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Gabriel Sterling, the chief operating officer for Georgia\u2019s Secretary of State Office, chuckled at the incredulity of Trump\u2019s claim about the Constitution when it was described by CNN\u2019s Pam Brown on Saturday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s ridiculous, it\u2019s insane, to suspend the Constitution. Come on man, seriously?\u201d said Sterling, a Republican who helped oversee Georgia\u2019s election in 2020, when President Joe Biden carried the state. \u201cI think more and more Republicans, Americans are saying, \u2018Ok I am good, I am done with this now, I\u2019m going to move on to the next thing.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s rant may be a sign of a stuttering 2024 campaign<\/h2>\n

The most immediate question raised by Trump\u2019s latest controversy is what it says about a presidential campaign that has been swallowed up by one far-right authoritarian sideshow after another.<\/p>\n

Far from barnstorming the nation, making a case on the economy, health care and immigration or outlining a program for the future, Trump has given comfort to zealots and insurrectionists.<\/p>\n

He hosted Kanye West at Mar-a-Lago last month, at a time when the rapper now known as Ye is in the middle of a vile streak of antisemitism and praising Adolf Hitler. The far-right Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes was at also at that dinner. Trump claimed he didn\u2019t know who Fuentes was but the former president still hasn\u2019t criticized his ideology. Last week, Trump, in a fundraising video, praised the mob that invaded the Capitol in the worst attack on US democracy in modern times, again promoting violence as an acceptable response to political grievances.<\/p>\n

His social media assault on the Constitution appears to be proving the point of the House select committee probing January 6, which has portrayed him as a clear and present danger to American democracy and met on Friday to consider criminal referrals to the Justice Department.<\/p>\n

Wyoming GOP Rep. Liz Cheney, vice chair of the committee, tweeted on Sunday: \u201cNo honest person can now deny that Trump is an enemy of the Constitution.\u201d Trump\u2019s latest wild social media post could even deepen his legal exposure as the Justice Department seeks evidence of his mindset as it investigates his conduct before the attack on the Capitol.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s doubling down on authoritarianism also follows a moment when much of the country, at least in crucial swing states, rejected his 2020 election denialism and anti-democratic chaos candidates he picked for the midterms \u2013 with a final test on Tuesday in Georgia\u2019s Senate runoff<\/a>. It appears to make it even more unlikely that the ex-president, even if he wins the Republican nomination, will be the kind of candidate who could win among the broader national electorate. After all, his message failed in two consecutive elections in 2020 and 2022. And even in the wilder reaches of the GOP, which Trump has dominated since 2015, a call to simply trash the Constitution might seem a stretch \u2013 and reflect the former president\u2019s increasing distance from reality.<\/p>\n

Why Trump\u2019s words are dangerous<\/h2>\n

One could argue that the most prudent response to Trump\u2019s latest radical rhetoric might be to ignore it and his bid for publicity.<\/p>\n

But even if his idea of crushing the Constitution looks far-fetched, his behavior needs to be taken seriously because of its possible future consequences.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s because Trump remains an extraordinarily influential force in the Republican Party. His acolytes hold outsized power in the new House majority set to take over in January, which they plan to use as a political weapon to promote his restoration in the White House. GOP leader Kevin McCarthy is appeasing this group in an increasingly troubled campaign for speaker. The California Republican also last week shielded Trump over criticism of the Fuentes dinner, saying that while such a person had no place in the party, Trump had condemned him four times \u2013 a false claim<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, in an electoral sense, the theory that Republican voters may be willing to move on from Trump \u2013 and to find a candidate who may reflect \u201cAmerica First\u201d populism but not dine with antisemites \u2013 has not yet been tested. Trump\u2019s claims that the 2020 election was stolen are still broadly accepted among GOP voters \u2013 only 24% of whom believe that Biden legitimately won in 2020, according to midterm election exit polls.<\/p>\n

And a GOP primary that includes multiple candidates competing with Trump for the presidential nomination could yet again splinter the vote against the former president and allow him to emerge at the top of a mostly winner-take-all delegate race, a vote that would put a prospective authoritarian who has already tried to dismantle the US system of democracy one step from a return to power.<\/p>\n

Ignoring or downplaying public evidence of extremism and incitement only allows it to become normalized. There is already proof that the ex-president\u2019s rhetoric can cause violence \u2013 after he told his supporters to \u201cfight like hell\u201d to save their country on January 6. And the rhetoric of people like West and Fuentes, with whom Trump has associated, risks normalizing odious forces in society that will grow if they are not challenged. Fuentes, after all, has appeared with Republican lawmakers like Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene \u2013 an increasingly influential voice in the House GOP conference.<\/p>\n

Years of norm crushing and acceptance of extremists by the twice-impeached former president never convinced the party to purge him or his views. Were it not for principled, conservative Republicans like Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and former Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers, Trump\u2019s election-stealing effort might have worked in 2020.<\/p>\n

As they work through an intense lame-duck session of Congress, Republican lawmakers are, for the umpteenth time, going to be asked this week about the tyrannical attitudes of the front-runner for their party\u2019s presidential nod.<\/p>\n

One newly elected Republican, Michael Lawler \u2013 who picked up a Democratic-held House seat critical to the slim GOP majority \u2013 stood up for the Constitution on CNN\u2019s \u201cState of the Union\u201d on Sunday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Constitution is set for a reason, to protect the rights of every American. And so I certainly don\u2019t endorse that language or that sentiment,\u201d Lawler told Jake Tapper. \u201cI think the former president would be well-advised to focus on the future, if he is going to run for president again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Republican Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio, who serves on the House Intelligence Committee, said he \u201cvehemently\u201d disagreed with Trump\u2019s statement and said his dinner with West and Fuentes was \u201catrocious\u201d and that voters would take both incidents into consideration.<\/p>\n

But a fellow Ohio Republican, Rep. David Joyce, demonstrated the characteristic reluctance of members of his party to confront an ex-president who remains hugely popular among its grassroots. Regarding the threat to the Constitution, Joyce said on ABC\u2019s \u201cThis Week\u201d on Sunday, \u201cYou know he says a lot of things but that doesn\u2019t mean that it\u2019s ever going to happen,\u201d adding that it was important to separate \u201cfact from fantasy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Joyce didn\u2019t directly condemn Trump\u2019s rhetoric and said he would support whomever the Republican Party nominates in 2024. The fact that Republicans are open to a potential president \u2013 who would be called upon to swear to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution but who has already called for its termination \u2013 speaks volumes about how much the GOP is still in Trump\u2019s shadow.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/article>\n<\/section>\n<\/section>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Analysis by Stephen Collinson, CNN, Mon December 5, 2022 Donald Trump\u2019s call for the termination of the Constitution is his most extreme anti-democratic statement yet and seems oblivious to the sentiments of voters who rejected election deniers in the midterm elections. Former President Donald Trump announces his 2024 White House bid at Mar-a-Lago on November […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1001004,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14167"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1001004"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14167"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14167\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14171,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14167\/revisions\/14171"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14167"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14167"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14167"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}