MAGA Extremists Will Become MUCH More Violent if Trump Wins

 

A new movie, Civil War, purports to explore a potential future in which the United States dissolves into fratricidal violence. All indications are that the film (which I have not seen) is critically sophisticated and thought-provoking. Michelle Goldberg, writing in the New York Times, notes that “it’s not a stretch to interpret the film as a premonition of how a seething, entropic country could collapse...”

 

As Goldberg is right to point out, the specter of political violence hangs heavily over the US. It is no longer an abstraction or hypothetical. Assaults such as those on Stephen Scalise and Paul Pelosi, to say nothing of the terrorist attacks of January 6, 2021, have engendered a climate of tension and fear.

 

But for all the very real tragedy that has already transpired and the genuine cause for apprehension as we face the future, it is important that we remain clearly analytical about what is likely to happen moving forward. There is a real danger that political violence will escalate, but the general sense of how and why that would occur is misguided. Most people worry about the potential for violence by MAGA extremists if Donald Trump loses the election this coming November. But a sharp escalation of political violence in the event of Trump’s defeat is highly unlikely. Rather, a surge of political violence by MAGA extremists is almost certain in the event of Trump’s victory.

 

Predicting what violence is likely to occur if Trump loses does not require occult powers or mysterious calculations. We only have to consult the record of what happened the last time that Trump lost an election. For all of Trump’s warnings of a “bloodbath” in the event of his defeat in 2024, the aftermath of the 2020 election all but proves that such dire prognostications are not likely to pay out.

 

There was violence after November 2020, but it peaked on January 6, 2021. The terrorist mobs that stormed the Capitol wounded police officers and suffered fatalities, and in the immediate wake of that awful day a frenzy of expectation developed among the fascist militias who had been most instrumental in the atrocities of January 6. Posters appeared everywhere calling for Trump’s supporters to “refuse to be silenced” and to join an “armed march on the Capitol and on all state capitals” scheduled for January 17, 2021.

 

Initially there seemed to be real reason to fear that January 17 would be another terrible day. But in the wake of the ratification of Joe Biden as President Elect it became clear that all of our sovereign institutions, from the Congress to the military to governors' mansions in all fifty states, would stand firm in support of the legitimate transfer of power. Knowing that any armed provocation would be met with a lethal response, fascist terrorists took the better part of valor on January 17, 2021. The day was not “silent,” but the loudest sounds of protest came from crickets.

 

What is most important to note in using January 17, 2021 as a gauge to predict what will happen after the election of 2024 is the fact that at that time Donald Trump was still president of the United States. Despite the fact that their Dear Leader was still Commander-in-Chief and possessed of the full powers of the presidency, fascist extremists remained in their hidey-holes on the single day when their violent assaults might have made the biggest impact on the nation’s psyche. If they did not go on the rampage then, how likely is it that they will do so while Joe Biden is not only the sitting President, but has been given another four years in office?

 

Any fears that violence will attend Trump’s defeat are rooted in an exaggerated estimation of his supporters' political convictions. Even the most extreme fascists in Trump’s coalition know that he is an utterly corrupt and incompetent clown. Dying to keep that man in office while he was still there was not worthwhile. Dying for the slim chance that you could somehow force him back into office over the will of the voters will be even less motivating.

 

If Trump wins the 2024 election, however, the entire motivational structure of Trump’s most extreme supporters changes. With Trump coming into office the impetus for fascist extremists to engage in acts of terror will be irresistible. Again, this is predictable because the fascists themselves are not fools. They know exactly what kind of venal grifter they are dealing with in Trump.

 

Committing acts of terror (say, assaulting a Planned Parenthood Clinic or a meeting of Campus Democrats) as Joe Biden is leaving office (or shortly after Trump has been sworn in) will force Trump to choose. Will he uphold the “rule of law” and risk alienating his base supporters, or will he remain true to the “war of us versus them” rhetoric that has propelled his political rise since 2015, and use his power to help effect “retribution” on “those animals” as he consistently promises on the campaign trail? Trump himself has little interest in any questions of governance, so the only way that fascists can guarantee that government power will be used against the “wrong people” will be to begin assaulting those people in the early stages of Trump’s second term, and force him to show the world where he stands.

 

That is the juncture at which we here in the US have arrived as a nation. If Joe Biden is elected, the specter of political violence may not go away immediately, but it will begin to recede. If Trump is elected, the political violence we have seen until now will barely qualify as a beginning. In that event, everyone should watch closely and take heed. If the full power of the US government falls into the hands of the fascist terrorists who engineered January 6, this country will not be a safe place for anyone possessed of an independent mind or a decent civic conscience.