While Trumpism is certainly not without its dangers, an even greater danger is a return of the neocons, who are presently embedded in the Biden regime in the person of figures like Victoria Nuland, and there is a possibility of the return of a full-blown neocon regime under the leadership of a President like Rubio, Cotton, Hawley, Cruz or some other such figure. Neocons have infiltrated Trumpism as well.

By Yoav Litvin, Truthout

The United States is continuing its reactionary response to the 2020 uprisings for Black lives. Republican representatives have increased efforts at redistricting, escalated draconian targeting of reproductive rights, and continue to attack education and books on racism, slavery and white supremacy; LGBTQ issues; and content depicting miscarriages, hysterectomies and pain during labor.

These right-wing efforts are fueled by social media and a rising embrace of conspiracy theories. Unfortunately, though perhaps predictably, the Democratic Party has been unable or unwilling to mount a progressive retort.

Truthout spoke with Anthony DiMaggio, associate professor of political science at Lehigh University, about the infiltration of fascism into contemporary political and media landscapes in the U.S. as outlined in his new book, Rising Fascism in America: It Can Happen Here (Routledge; 2022).

Yoav Litvin: How is your book relevant in 2022? Didn’t Donald Trump lose in 2020?

Anthony DiMaggio: By losing in 2020, Trump learned from his mistakes. Trump really didn’t focus heavily on the (fictitious) voter fraud issue until after the election, meaning there was only a couple of months for him to try and mobilize his coup. Not enough pressure could be built up in that time to compel state legislators and other officials to embrace his “Big Lie.” People like Brad Raffensperger, the Georgia secretary of state, and other officials certifying the election did not feel the sort of pressure from the base that state and national partisans are now feeling to fall in line behind Trump’s propaganda. Plus, there will be many more true believers in his lie come 2024, after four years of pushing this fraud. Many of those candidates are running for office as we speak, raising the prospect that these true believers could monkey wrench the 2024 results if they do not cut toward Trump when it comes to certifying a winner.

If Trump runs in 2024, we are opening ourselves up to a world of danger. The Republican Party is setting up a paradigm where if they win, they deem the election as legitimate, and if they lose, they refuse to certify for the Democratic candidate in swing states, offering up bogus voter fraud claims. We see polls now where a third to almost half of Republicans believe violence may be needed to save the country from a corrupt system, and I don’t know how one can realistically divorce that rage from Big Lie voter fraud claims that are driving right-wing outrage today. If even a small fraction of these people is serious and take to the streets after Trump calls on them in 2024 to “fight like hell, or you won’t have a country anymore,” we will be on the precipice of a crisis. And this, coupled with swing states refusing to certify a legitimate Democratic winner in multiple states — or even the precedent of one state refusing to certify — may be enough to provoke a full-on constitutional crisis. Simply put, this is not where we want to be as a country. It’s playing with fire and could lead to the emergence of a de facto dictatorship under Trump, or to a constitutional crisis and national implosion and collapse.

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