While he occupied the White House, Donald Trump was a relentless presence in American life, a perpetual outrage machine generating endless division, media coverage and social media fuel for extremism. The last 18 months have offered the American public some reprieve from the daily onslaught. Trump isn’t in the White House, and his name won’t appear on any ballot this November. But make no mistake: The extremist MAGA movement he spawned is very much on the ballot.
In state after state, MAGA extremists have taken over the Republican Party, winning primaries and pushing a radical and unpopular agenda. In fact, it is only because MAGA extremists are so unpopular that the outcome of next week’s election is still in doubt.
Consider that Republicans have to flip only a net of one seat to take control in the Senate, and most races are in states that Biden narrowly won. Given the historical advantage of the party out of power and the current political climate, Republicans should be netting at least four seats in the Senate. Anything short of that would be a dramatic underperformance on their part.
In the House of Representatives, Republicans face a similarly low bar of only having to flip 1 percent of congressional seats (a net of five) to gain control. Yet with one week to go, Democrats still have a one in five chance of maintaining control of the House, not too dissimilar from Trump’s chances of winning the presidency in 2016.
How is this possible? MAGA extremism.
Unlike most midterms, Americans view this election as a choice, and they are increasingly anxious about what MAGA Republicans are doing to this country. Elections are about the future, but two significant events in the recent past offer the American people a clear signal of what MAGA Republicans would do moving forward.
First, the attempted coup that culminated in the violent attack on Jan. 6, 2021, was a horrific stain on Trump and the Republican Party. Yet, far from repudiating the election denialism that fueled the violence and crimes, more than 340 Republicans on the ballot this November — in House, Senate and state-level races — continue to embrace and spread them. Stating plainly that Trump lost a free and fair election is a bridge too far for every MAGA Republican, and it reminds the American people that if they are still willing to lie about 2020, there are no bounds to the lengths they will go to gain power. MAGA secretaries of state candidates are signaling they will only certify races if their preferred candidates are victorious. So it isn’t surprising that voters are reporting heightened concerns about the threats to our democracy.
Second, in June, the MAGA-led Supreme Court eviscerated 50 years of precedent by overturning Roe v. Wade, stripping millions of women of the fundamental freedom and right to decide about their own bodies. MAGA Republicans in Congress have made clear that they will not stop there, pushing for a national ban on abortion that would ensure that 70 million women from coast to coast would lose that right.
The violent insurrection and overturning of Roe are not theoretical threats. They have upended life in America — particularly for women — and shattered our nation’s democratic core. They are also a reminder of how far MAGA Republicans will go to gain power at the expense of fundamental American rights and freedoms.
So, when the American people consider the risk of putting Republicans in charge, they have to think seriously about what else is at stake. There should now be no doubt that given a chance, MAGA Republicans will push their deeply unpopular and damaging agenda onto the American people, including ending Social Security and Medicare as we know it; driving the U.S. economy off a cliff by defaulting on our debt payments; preventing Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices; and even overturning the results of future elections when they don’t like the outcome.
Democrats are facing significant headwinds this election, but a close outcome is an indictment of the extremism coursing through the Republican Party and its continuing threats. Trump’s name may not be on the ballot, but MAGA extremism will be. And no matter what happens next week, it will be at the core of every future election until MAGA extremists either succeed in ending our 246-year experiment in democracy or are driven out of it at the ballot box.
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ABOUT THE WRITER
Navin Nayak is the president and executive director of the Center for American Progress Action Fund. He wrote this for InsideSources.com.
