Why "No Kings" Terrifies Republicans

To listen to the false narrative of Republicans and, of course the Felon, the Felon won the the 2024 election by a landslide and was handed a mandate.  The truth is - as with most things with the Felon - something quite different. Yes, the Felon won slightly more votes than Kamala Harris, but the total votes he received total up to slightly over one third of all registered voters.  This hardly constitutes a landslide or any semblance of a mandate.  Add to this the reality that according to a new poll, the Felon's disapproval rating far exceeds his approval rating, and it is becoming increasing difficult for Republicans to ignore objective reality even as the Felon continues to live in a fantasy world where lies override objective facts.  Faced with yesterday's "No Kings" events where millions of Americans came out across the nation to protest the Felon and his policies, all Republicans could do is spout lies and claim that event participants are "anti-America" and comprised of  subversives.  Indeed, in the words of White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt (who is proving to lie with even more abandonment than even Sarah Huckabee Sanders), that “the Democrat Party’s main constituency is made up of Hamas terrorists, illegal aliens and violent criminals.” A column in the New York Times looks at the Republican mindset:

Millions of Americans are gathering across the country on Saturday — including in Washington, D.C. — to protest the monarchical pretensions of the Trump administration.

In the four months since the last No Kings protests, [the Felon] President Trump has gone even further down the road of claiming plenary authority over the executive branch. He has continued to claim the right to fire anyone he pleases, to cancel or spend federal funds outside congressional appropriations and to launch lethal strikes against foreign civilians without explicit authorization from Congress or evidence of imminent threat to Americans.

The [Felon] president has tried to leverage the power of the federal government against his political opponents and legal adversaries, sending the Justice Department after James Comey, a former director of the F.B.I.; Attorney General Letitia James of New York; and one of Trump’s former national security advisers, John Bolton. . . . . With Trump, it’s as if you crossed the bitter paranoia of Richard Nixon with the absolutist ideology of Charles I.

Today’s protesters, in other words, are standing for nothing less than the anti-royal and republican foundations of American democracy. For the leaders of the Republican Party, however, these aren’t citizens exercising their fundamental right to dissent but subversives out to undermine the fabric of the nation.

Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming said of a planned No Kings protest that it would be a “big ‘I hate America’ rally” of “far-left activist groups.” House Majority Leader Steve Scalise of Louisiana also called No Kings a “hate America rally.” House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters that he expected to see “Hamas supporters,” “antifa types” and “Marxists” on “full display.” People, he said without a touch of irony, “who don’t want to stand and defend the foundational truths of this republic.” And all of this is of a piece with the recent declaration by the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, that “the Democrat Party’s main constituency is made up of Hamas terrorists, illegal aliens and violent criminals.”

[W]hat explains the Republican Party’s posture toward these protests, beyond a desire to delegitimize their political opponents? I have two main thoughts.

First, there is the party’s precarious political position in the midst of a government shutdown. Although no one has escaped responsibility for the shutdown, a higher percentage Americans blame Trump and Republicans in Congress than they do Democrats, according to a recent poll conducted for The Associated Press. More Americans than not also want Congress to extend enhanced federal tax credits for people who buy health insurance through the Affordable Care Act, which has put Republican politicians on the defensive. In demonizing the No Kings protests, Republicans might simply be trying to turn the public’s attention somewhere else.

Second, much of Trump’s effort to extend his authority across the whole of American society depends on more or less voluntary compliance from civil society and various institutions outside of government. And that, in turn, rests on the idea that Trump is the authentic tribune of the people. . . . Nationwide protests comprised of millions of people are a direct rebuke to the president’s narrative. They send a signal to the most disconnected parts of the American public that the [Felon] president is far from as popular as he says he is, and they send a clear warning to those institutions under pressure from the administration: Bend the knee and lose our business and support.

To the degree that major protests could undermine the administration’s ability to exert political authority, it makes a whole lot of sense for Republicans and the White House to spend their energy attacking the No Kings movement.

And this, I think, should serve as an important reminder to opponents of the administration that for all its boasts and bluster, it knows as well as anyone that the president is unpopular and that his administration is vulnerable.