GOP candidates are now mimicking Trump’s authoritarianism. That’s ominous.

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Around the country, Republicans embroiled in tough primaries are increasingly emulating President Trump — by echoing his xenophobia, his veiled racist appeals, his attacks on the news media, and even occasionally his calls for imprisoning his political opponents.

Meanwhile, all indications are that Trump is heading for a serious confrontation with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III or Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein over the Russia investigation.

So how long until multiple GOP primary candidates begin seriously running on the message that the Mueller probe is part of an illegitimate Deep State coup that justifies Trump shutting it down by any means necessary — that is, on a message of unabashed authoritarianism?

Two new articles — one in the New York Times, the other in National Journal — illustrate what’s happening in many of these GOP primaries. The Times piece, by Jeremy Peters, reports that in West Virginia, GOP Senate primary candidate Don Blankenship is running an ad that says: “We don’t need to investigate our president. We need to arrest Hillary … Lock her up!”

 

In multiple GOP races across the country, the Times piece reports, candidates are employing phrases such as “drain the swamp,” “build the wall,” “rigged system” and even “fake news.” The GOP Senate candidate in Tennessee ran an ad that promises to stand with Trump “every step of the way to build that wall,” and even echoes Trump’s attacks on African American football players protesting systemic racism and police brutality:  “I stand when the president walks in the room. And yes, I stand when I hear ‘The Star-Spangled Banner.'”

 

 

Meanwhile, National Journal’s Josh Kraushaar reports that in the Indiana Senate GOP primary, Mike Braun, the candidate who is most vocally emphasizing Trump’s messages — on trade, the Washington “swamp” and “amnesty” — appears to be gaining the advantage. Braun’s ads basically recast true conservatism as Trumpism in its incarnation as populist anti-establishment ethno-nationalism.

It gets worse. As the Indianapolis Star recently reported, one of the Indiana GOP Senate candidates has bashed “Crooked Hillary Clinton,” and all three have cast aspersions on the Mueller probe. One called it a “fishing expedition,” and another claimed: “Nothing’s been turned up except that Hillary Clinton is the real guilty party here.”

Josh Kraushaar

 

✔@HotlineJosh

 

 

All three Rs running for Senate in Indiana said that Mueller investigation "should end" in debate tonight. #partyoftrump https://howeypolitics.com/ 

6:04 PM - Apr 15, 2018

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The question all this raises is whether there is a large swath of GOP primary voters who are fully prepared to march behind Trump into full-blown authoritarianism. The original plan was for Republicans to make tax cuts the centerpiece of their midterm campaign agenda. But in the Virginia gubernatorial race, the Republican candidate resorted to Trumpian xenophobia and a defense of Confederate statues to activate the GOP base, and in the Pennsylvania House special election, Republicans cycled the tax cuts out of their messaging. There just doesn’t appear to be much of a constituency for Paul Ryan Republicanism among today’s GOP voters.

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Bree Newsome: Confederate monuments 'symbolize slavery and systemic racism'

Bree Newsome: Confederate monuments 'symbolize slavery and systemic racism'(Gillian Brockell, Kate Woodsome, Jesse Mesner-Hage/The Washington Post)

The retirement of the House speaker himself has brought this recognition to a head. Figures such as Ryan and Sen. Marco Rubio were supposed to create a youthful, forward-looking aura around limited government, constitutional conservatism and tax-cutting, safety-net-shredding plutocracy, broadening their appeal to (and edging the GOP into a new accommodation with) 21st-century diversifying America. But Trump won, Ryan is retiring to spend more time with his faded college Ayn Rand poster, and on his way out Ryan has acquiesced to Trump’s nativist nationalism and has lent his tacit support to the weaponization of Congress’ oversight machinery against the investigation into Trump, furthering his assaults on our institutions and the rule of law.

 

What happens if Trump fires Rosenstein or makes a serious effort to remove Mueller? It is not hard to envision many GOP candidates siding with Trump as a way to energize Republican voters, thus further rallying them against the investigation and making it even less likely that GOP lawmakers intervene. In other words, the GOP’s slide into authoritarianism could get a whole lot worse.