Let’s keep this simple. Forget about Trump wanting to be a kingmaker, or drive the future of the Republican Party. His first priority is staying out of prison.
That’s it. Everything he does has that as a motivator.
With criminal investigations going on in several states and at the federal level, and the statements made by former confidants and employees, it seems a good bet that we could see charges against him in the near future.
And he really only has one tool left. The threat of his base becoming violent (again) and the civil unrest that would follow. This is why he is keeping his base stoked and continuing the false claim about the 2020 election.
For those who don’t understand why some of those on the right keep defending him, understand that they know what he will do, but think appeasement will work. They can see as easily as anyone else that Republican Party unity is impossible with Trump in the picture. Yet they won’t give him up.
Yes, there are plenty of them who are willing to throw in with abandoning lawful elections and adopting authoritarianism. But many others will just pretend that the lies are true out of fear of some socialist boogeyman, and accept fascism as necessary.
Trump’s former attorney Michael Cohen correctly predicted many of the actions Trump has taken, including that Trump would never peacefully concede power. He has since predicted that Trump will flee the country before facing justice in court.
I say we need to include him launching a civil war to try and stop justice as a possibility. Will he do it? Yes. He is a psychopath that lives by the motto of when you are hit, hit back harder. There is no good reason to think he would put anything ahead of his own safety.
I once called for making a deal to stop that potential conflict. But I no longer think that is sensible. Nothing Trump has ever done should lead anyone to think he will keep a deal. And we have seen him get away with crimes and become encouraged to do more. Hello Senator Susan Collins, did he learn his lesson yet?
We have a long road ahead of us, and we are no longer in a country where the masses accept the outcome of elections when they lose. We now have a substantial minority who feel they are entitled to win, and that anything other than winning is fraud. Those who disagree with them are now the enemy, and no longer their fellow countrymen.
Too many of those will become an insurgency, and when Donald Trump is charge and arrested, they will become violent. Maybe not that day, but as certain as the sunrise they will.
But what we face is a loss of the Republic, and a future of dictatorship. Not just of Trump, but of those would be tyrants who wait in the wings to take the reins.
Appeasement cannot and will not work.
We must slay the dragon, and conquer his cult of followers.