It should be apparent to most political observers that the Party of Lincoln is dead at the local. state, and federal levels. It has been replaced by a Party (called Trumpist) that rejects everything democracy and republics profess to be about.
This did not start with Donald Trump. This evolution has been proceeding since 1965 when ex Dixiecrats in the Democratic Party forged ties in corporate interests in the Republican and foreign policy hawks that produced the Reagan Presidency, the Gingrich House, and the George W. Bush Administration.
Over the last 18 years, Republicans have not even hidden their disdain for Democracy, inclusion, or republics at all levels of governance. Examples include:
- Treating the 2000 and 2016 Presidential Elections as mandates for conservatism even though their candidates lost the popular vote.
- Holding open a Supreme Court Seat in 2016 so they can get an opportunity to fill the vacancy when the Executive Branch switched parties in 2017.
- Obstructing and filibustering bills such as needed infrastructure and raising the minimum wage despite substantial support from the American People.
- Gerrymandering districts to favor the Republican Party in local and federal districts. This has resulted in Republicans maintaining legislative majorities in state legislatures like Michigan, Wisconsin, and North Carolina despite losing the state popular vote to Democrats (who won virtually all the statewide offices in those states).
- Restricting early voting times and imposing stringent voter id requirements.
- Allowing Nazis and other fringe elements to run under the Republican banner. In Arizona, a Prescott lawmaker (David Stringer) is under fire for saying over the last six months “There are not enough white kids to go around” in public schools and African Americans “do not blend in.” On December 4, the Prescott City Council voted 6-1 to call on him to do the right thing and resign. Arizona’s Governor, Doug Ducey came under criticism for taking a smiling picture with a group of white supremacists.
- Nullifying local election results like when the conservative Arizona State Legislature overruled laws passed in Tempe and Bisbee on combatting Dark Money and harm to the environment.
- Lame duck Republican Legislatures that are about to share power with Democratic Governors in Wisconsin and Michigan, trying to shift power, despite an uproar from the majority of the people, from state-held offices to the legislative branches they still control. North Carolina Republicans attempted to do this after Democrat Roy Cooper won the Governorship creating much friction. Court rulings and voter rejections have largely stymied these reactionary shenanigans by the Republican Party although some disputes still remain.
- Possibly employing voter fraud to rob Democrats of a potential forty-first House pickup in North Carolina.
People who once believed in what the Republican Party once represented need to face reality. The Republican Party has become a reactionary, nativist (racist), quasi-fascist, anti-Democratic and anti-Republic entity. The Party that produced Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S Grant, Theodore Roosevelt, Harold Stassen, Arthur Vandenburg, Nelson Rockefeller, and Dwight Eisenhower is gone. Recent extremist stances and bullish positions by current Party leaders like Newt Gingrich. George, W, Bush Donald Trump, and Mitch McConnell make recent Republican Presidents like Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, and George H.W. Bush look like moderate Democrats now.
This country needs two political parties that believe in the American Dream and the American Experiment in Democratic Republicanism. It can not thrive if only the Democrats hold to those ideals. Republicans outside of the leadership need to take their party back, get rid of the jackbooted thugs that have destroyed it, and make it the Party of Lincoln once again.
https://ballotpedia.org/Conflicts_between_Gov._Roy_Cooper_and_the_North_Carolina_General_Assembly
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/12/4/18123784/gop-legislature-wisconsin-michigan-power-grab-lame-duck
https://www.vox.com/2018/7/9/17525860/nazis-russell-walker-arthur-jones-republicans-illinois-north-carolina-virginia