The Malignant Loser and his circle of white nationalist advisors have been quite open about their plans should they gain power after November, and they should be taken literally and seriously. One advisor, the openly Christofascist former OMB director Russell Vought, has the agenda:
Apart from Donald Trump’s objectives, political operatives surrounding the GOP front-runner have their own policy goals. At the top of the list? Infusing Christian nationalism into the heart of his next term.
Behind the hidden agenda is Trump’s former director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought, who runs the influential conservative think tank the Center for Renewing America. Over the last several years, Vought—who has been rumored to have a good shot at becoming chief of staff should Trump win a second term—has increasingly adopted the ideology that Christian nationalists are under attack.
Documents by CRA staff list several Christian nationalist-oriented goals as a part of the think tank’s top priorities in a second Trump term, reported Politico Tuesday. Other contributions to the list included invoking the Insurrection Act in order to stamp out dissenting protests and creating other ways to expand Trump’s presidential power.
But Vought also serves as an adviser to the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, which has proposed a flurry of other objectives for a potential second term, including repealing policies that help LGBTQ+ people and single mothers, on the basis that these laws threaten “Americans’ fundamental liberties.”
Vought’s simmering extremism has been influenced by a yearslong partnership with Christian nationalist William Wolfe. Vaught has publicly lauded Wolfe’s work on “scoping out a sound Christian Nationalism,” saying he’s “proud” to be a part of it... (our emphasis)
When we say "Christofascists," in Vought and Wolfe's cases the emphasis is mainly on "fascist." They have other plans to use the military beyond putting down "dissenting protests":
Trump pledges that as president he would immediately launch “the largest domestic deportation operation in American history.” As a model, he points to an Eisenhower-era program known as “Operation Wetback,” using a derogatory slur for Mexican migrants. The operation used military tactics to round up and remove migrant workers, sometimes transporting them in dangerous conditions that led to some deaths. Former administration officials and policy experts said staging an even larger operation today would face a bottleneck in detention space — a problem that Trump adviser Stephen Miller and other allies have proposed addressing by building mass deportation camps. [snip]
Trump has made similar promises and has used inflammatory smears since his 2016 campaign. But he, his aides and allies say a second turn in office would be more effective in operating the levers of the federal bureaucracy and less vulnerable to internal resistance. During his term, former officials said, Trump learned to install more officials at the Department of Homeland Security who would carry out his orders instead of trying to curb his impulses.
Throughout his current campaign, the former president has exerted his influence on the immigration policy debate on several fronts. He pressured congressional Republicans to reject a bipartisan compromise to expand enforcement funding and powers, arguing that it would give the Democrats a political victory and that it was not restrictive enough. He has also escalated his use of dehumanizing language to describe migrants, accusing them of “poisoning the blood of our country” and calling the record unauthorized border crossings an “invasion,” an “open wound” and a source of imminent terrorist attacks.
But his deportation proposal is one part of his emerging platform that experts, current and former government officials and others described as especially alarming, impractical and prone to significant legal and logistical hurdles... (our emphasis)
Those hurdles won't stop these jackboots from doing what they say they'd do.
It can't be said enough: this is American fascism. It's not an exaggeration. It's not a fantasy. It's not off in the distance. It's here now, and it's being open and plain about its ultra- reactionary agenda. They have the advantage of having learned from their mistakes in the Malignant Loser's administration, and would be "more effective in operating the levers" of government if given a second chance. People need to understand why putting these crackpot Christofascist charlatans in power once again will forever change this country into something dark and unrecognizable.
It also can't be said enough: (to borrow a quote from Pennsylvania's Gov. Josh Shapiro) to forestall this, "we need to stop worrying and start working."
BONUS: More discussion here.
(Photo: the banality of evil personified /Seth Wenig, AP)
