Republicans must reckon with their own rhetoric

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/07/2024 (449 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Former U.S. president Donald Trump joined a short, infamous list on Saturday, as the latest target of a political assassination attempt in U.S. history.

The attempt on Trump’s life was shocking, leaving one attendee of Trump’s Butler, Pa. campaign rally dead and two others critically injured. Trump survived the shooting, though by inches, and images of Trump triumphantly pumping his fist as the blood from his grazed ear streaks his face have become iconic.

As the world processes the shock of the incident, condemnations of political violence have been universal. That is of course a justifiable reaction to an attempt to murder a political candidate. We must be able to carry out our political battles at the ballot box.

However, what is harder to swallow are the condemnations from the American right wing about supposed “incitement” against Trump.

“TO THE MEDIA: THIS IS YOUR FAULT,” blared Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene on X shortly after the shooting. “They demonized us, they called us Nazis, and they spent the last decade inciting violence against us.”

It’s not a stretch to say that Trump’s opponents, including those in the media, have demonized the former president or made comparisons to various fascist movements of decades past. But claiming that “the media” or even Trump’s elected political opponents have incited violence against him is a stretch indeed.

The evidence suggests that if any side of this political battle is guilty of introducing the spectre of violence, it’s Trump’s.

Let’s just take Taylor-Greene as an example. CNN reported, back in January 2021, that the congresswoman had indicated support for killing notable Democrats on her social media pages before she was elected. But election to office didn’t cool her rhetoric; a campaign ad in 2020 depicted her toting an assault rifle as a warning against “antifa terrorists” and destroying a Toyota Prius (a common stand-in of the right wing for liberal politics) with a high-powered rifle.

It doesn’t end there. Republican Eric Greitens, a former Missouri governor, held a shotgun in one ad during his run for the U.S. Senate while encouraging his supporters to “get a RINO (Republican in Name Only) hunting permit”; Republican former Idaho lieutenant-governor Janice McGeachin posted a video of herself firing an assault rifle on X with the caption “The 2nd Amendment was never about bird hunting” and a slew of hashtags including #MakeIdahoFreeAgain.

There are the grim images from Jan. 6, an act of actual mass political violence by Trump’s supporters against his opponents, which included some participants building a gallows within view of the U.S. Capitol. And of course, there’s the riot itself, in which Trump supporters stormed the Capitol, terrorizing lawmakers and leaving one U.S. Capitol Police officer dead.

Then there’s the latest example of an American using violence against a political figure: 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, the registered Republican who shot Trump in the ear.

If a person was to take Republican office-holders at their word, the logical conclusion would be that some Republicans, particularly Trump’s MAGA sect, want what they want badly enough to turn it into a gunfight. They’ve suggested as much for years.

U.S. President Joe Biden and other prominent Democrats have been swift to condemn the shooting and express sympathy for Trump. There is an opportunity this week, as the Republicans hold their national convention, for the party to take stock of the situation and make a change.

That change can start right at the top, with Trump himself, the man in the best position to call for a better way forward.