There’s a tendency in politics to vastly overstate the importance of things—gaffes, debate stand-offs, testy press conferences—that casual observers find irresistible, but which rarely have any effect on actual outcomes. Recently, there has been no better example of this than the so-called impending civil war in the Republican Party.
When, for example, sources told reporters that Mitch McConnell privately had not decided yet on whether he would vote to impeach Donald Trump, Twitter was abuzz with energy and optimism that the Republican Party may finally be turning the page. Commentators spoke of a “civil war” brewing in the GOP, and after Democrats swept the Senate races in Georgia, anonymous sources insisted that Republicans were ready to turn on Trump.
Obviously, none of that happened. In a matter of weeks, Republicans lined up to acquit Trump for inciting a violent attack on the U.S. Capitol. Polls now show that the vast majority of Republicans believe Trump’s big lie that he won the election and, by all measures, he is the favorite to be the 2024 nominee for president. Since leaving office, Trump has taken on a sort of mythical, leader-in-exile status, with several prominent Republicans taking the trip down to Mar-a-Lago to dine with him.
So when Liz Cheney, the staunch conservative congresswoman from Wyoming, made it known that she believes Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election, it was not difficult to predict where it would lead. For her sins, Republicans are currently in the process of purging her from her leadership role within the party.
Cheney responded with an op-ed yesterday in the Washington Post, which gobbled up social media as further evidence that the Republican Party is in shambles. The crux of Cheney’s argument is entirely familiar by now to those who have followed the past few GOP “civil wars.” The Republican Party, we are told, needs to decide what it really is:
“The Republican Party is at a turning point, and Republicans must decide whether we are going to choose truth and fidelity to the Constitution … The question before us now is whether we will join Trump’s crusade to delegitimize and undo the legal outcome of the 2020 election, with all the consequences that might have.”
This sort of framing plays well on Twitter and cable news—here’s a prominent Republican standing up to Trump and sparking a bitter brawl within the party. But given everything we have experienced over the past five years, it is disingenuous to state that the Republican Party is at a “turning point.” That ship seems to have sailed long ago, around the time the vast majority of the party stood behind Trump’s reelection and then continued to support his attacks on democracy even after he lost. Cheney, who is being swiftly condemned with very little prominent support, should know this better than anyone.
But this is more than just cable news hosts itching for a juicy story, or a damaged politician eyeing a graceful exit. The idea that the Republican Party can be saved has been adopted at the highest echelons of the Democratic Party as well, all the way up to President Biden. Here’s what he said today about the effort to oust Cheney:
“It seems as though the Republican Party is trying to identify what it stands for. And they're in the midst of significant sort of mini-revolution going on in the Republican Party … I think the Republicans are further away from trying to figure out who they are and what they stand for than I thought they would be at this point.”
It is not immediately clear what evidence Biden is relying on for his contention that the Republican Party “is trying to identify what it stands for.” Is it the ousting of a long-time leader for simply acknowledging Trump lost the election? Is it the vast majority of Republican voters believing the big lie? Is it the acquittal of Trump for inciting an attack on the Capitol?
Indeed, there is really not an iota of evidence to support Biden’s or Cheney’s claim that the Republican Party is at a turning point or struggling to figure out what it believes. To the contrary, the Republican Party is very firm in what it stands for: if you believe Trump won the election, you are welcome; if you do not, you will be purged from the party. There is, frankly, very little disagreement on this point within the Republican Party, which is why it is breaking news when someone like Cheney speaks out. As Matt Ford writes in The New Republic:
The GOP’s vision for American life is that Democrats stole the 2020 election from Donald Trump. The party’s central idea for national governance is that Donald Trump should be in charge of it. And its policy agenda is, well, doing things that could make it easier for Trump to win in 2024.
Cable news hosts and Twitter-buffs may enjoy watching members of Trump’s own party ruffle his feathers, and Democratic leaders may enjoy the luxury of having everyone focus their attention on something other than them. But let’s be real: there is no fight happening here. Cheney, Mitt Romney and other Never Trumpers lost the fight long ago, and the longer we refuse to acknowledge that, the more victories Trump and his enablers will be able to claim.
Sadly, the desperate hope we place in people like Cheney is directly traceable to the inability—and oftentimes refusal—of Democrats to themselves take the fight directly to the Republican Party. It is no secret that to truly beat the Trumpian, fascist movement that is consuming the Republican Party, Democrats must use the raw power that voters have given to them by, among other things, nuking the filibuster, expanding the courts, and passing a new Voting Rights Act. But the unease that Democratic leaders have when it comes to those priorities necessitates an alternative path—which is how we end up with the myth that the Republican Party may implode on its own and recreate itself as an honest negotiator.
But that’s all it is: a myth. We know by now that Republicans cannot be saved, and that the only path forward is to beat them. I regret to inform you, however, that Liz Cheney will not be much help in that task.