Republicans Are Now Officially The Party Of The Mob And Violent Seditious Insurrectionists

Friday was one of those dueling narrative news days.

On one side of the screen was former Vice President Mike Pence telling the far-right Federalist Society that Donald Trump is wrong to argue that he had the authority to cancel the vote of over 81 million Americans who elected Joe Biden president and to give life to Donald Trump’s coup plot to steal the election in the House of Representatives, aided and abetted by GQP lawmakers (his co-conspirators).

On the other side of the screen was RNC Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel holding a voice vote of RNC delegates on a censure resolution to censure Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for participating in the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol.

More telling, the RNC delegates formally adopted the position that the Republican Party is now officially the party of the violent mob and sides with the seditious insurrectionists who tried to overthrow American democracy on January 6, 2021, and who erected a gallows and chanted “hang Mike Pence,” rebranding this mob violence as “legitimate public discourse” in true Orwellian fashion.

American democracy is in peril from what was formerly the Republican Party, now the personality cult of donald Trump and a violent mob.

Former Vice President Mike Pence, some 13 months after the MAGA/QAnon violent seditious insurrection on January 6, 2021, finally found his balls that his wife keeps in a jar hidden under their bed. (“Mommy” immediately demanded that he return them to her, and she has hidden them in a more secure location).

The New York Times reports, ‘Trump Is Wrong,’ Pence Says of False Claim About Overturning Election:

Speaking to a gathering of [the Federlost Society] near Orlando, Fla., the former vice president said he understands “the disappointment so many feel about the last election” but repudiated Mr. Trump’s false claims that Mr. Pence could reject the Electoral College results and alter the outcome last year.

“President Trump is wrong,” said Mr. Pence, in his remarks before the Federalist Society, a conservative legal organization. “I had no right to overturn the election.”

[Mr.] Pence cast his opposition on Friday as larger than the immediate political moment, implying that the false claims pushed by Mr. Trump and his followers threatened to undermine American democracy.

“The truth is there’s more at stake than our party or our political fortunes,” he said. “If we lose faith in the Constitution, we won’t just lose elections — we’ll lose our country.”

[Mr.] Pence described Jan. 6 as a “dark day” in Washington. Such a description runs counter to an attempt by some on the right to rewrite history by describing the siege as a peaceful rally and by calling the rioters “political prisoners.” And he urged Mr. Trump and his party to accept the results of the last election.

“Whatever the future holds, I know we did our duty that day,” Mr. Pence said. “I believe the time has come to focus on the future.”

But Mr. Pence stopped short of completely breaking with the right-wing base that remains deeply influenced by Mr. Trump.

Mr. Pence did not explicitly say that Mr. Trump lost the election and he declined to address the false claims of election fraud still being pushed by the former president and his supporters. The carefully constructed wording of his rebuke shows an effort by Mr. Pence to defend his own actions on Jan. 6, while not completely alienating a Republican base that remains animated by conspiracy theories of a stolen election. Their support could be crucial in any 2024 primary contest.

Notably Mike Pence said nothing about those responsible for the MAGA/QAnon violent seditious insurrection on January 6, 2021, being held accountable at law. He is a critical fact witness to the Coup Plot and knows exactly who the coup plotters are. But he is resisting voluntarily meeting with the January 6 Committee to testify about everything he knows. He may have to be subpoeaned to compel his testimony. He is no patriot. His comments to the Federalist Society simply stated an indisputably true fact.

Thankfully, the National Archives says it will turn over Mike Pence’s records to January 6 panel:

David Ferriero, archivist of the United States, told Trump in a letter Tuesday that he will give the documents to House investigators “after consultation with the counsel to the president and the assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel, and as instructed by President Biden.”

The Archives will deliver the records to the select committee on March 3 “unless prohibited by court order,” Ferriero wrote.

Pence’s comments came just hours after the Republican Party voted to censure two Republican lawmakers for taking part in the House investigation of the Jan. 6 attack.

The Washington Post reports, RNC votes to condemn Cheney, Kinzinger for serving on House committee investigating Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol by pro-Trump mob:

In an extraordinary rebuke, the Republican National Committee voted Friday to condemn Reps. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), the two Republican members of a House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob.

The censure resolution passed overwhelmingly on a voice vote with no debate or discussion. It said the behavior of Cheney and Kinzinger “has been destructive to the institution of the U.S. House of Representatives, the Republican Party and our republic.” The two lawmakers also voted to impeach former president Donald Trump after last year’s deadly insurrection.

In addition to Friday’s formal censure at the party’s winter meeting in Salt Lake City, the RNC may fund a primary challenge to Cheney in Wyoming after Republican leaders passed a special rule to recognize her challenger as the party’s presumptive nominee.

RNC Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel defended the move Thursday in an interview with The Washington Post.

“We’ve had two members engage in a Democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens who engaged in legitimate political discourse,” she said. “This has gone beyond their original intent. They are not sticking up for hard-working Republicans.”

Does this mob violence look like “legitimate political discourse” to you? The New York Times’ “Day of Rage” video history of January 6, 2021:

Just hours after the GQP said Capitol rioters were engaging in “legitimate political discourse,” New Jan. 6 Footage Shows Capitol Rioter Threatening To ‘Cut Their Head Off’:

Newly released video from the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack shows a Texas man ranting about a “stolen” presidential election and calling for elected officials to be publicly killed.

“Cut their head off!” he yells at one point.

"Cut their head off!" Nichols says. "Republican protestors are trying to enter the House right now at the Capitol is the word that I’m getting. So if that’s true, then get up in there. If you voted for treason, we’re going to drag your ass through the streets." pic.twitter.com/CCggMaTFWC

— Tom Dreisbach (@TomDreisbach) February 5, 2022

Its release by the Justice Department came just hours after top Republican Party officials issued a resolution on Friday stating that the people who mobbed the Capitol had engaged in “legitimate political discourse.”

The man in the video, Ryan Nichols, was arrested in the days after the attack and pleaded guilty to all of the charges against him, which include assault with a crowbar and pepper spray. His case is still pending in federal court.

Nichols filmed himself talking about Vice President Mike Pence, whom President Donald Trump told his supporters had the power to overturn the result of a presidential election during the official certification process ― an idea that is false. At his “Stop the Steal” rally held directly before the attack on the Capitol, Trump had expressed his hope that Pence would do his bidding and intervene. Pence did not.

“I’m hearing reports that Pence caved,” Nichols says in the video. “I’m telling you, if Pence caved, we’re gonna drag motherfuckers through the streets.”

“You fucking politicians are gonna get fucking drug through the streets! Because we’re not going to have our fucking shit stolen,” he says to cheers from the Trump supporters around him.

“I’m telling you right now, Ryan Nichols said it: If you voted for fucking treason, we’re gonna drag your fucking ass through the street,” he exclaims, later adding: “So let us find out, let the patriots find out you fucking treasoned this country!”

Nichols was charged alongside a friend, Alex Harkrider. Court documents show how the men posted about their involvement in the riot to Facebook.

At one point outside the Capitol, Nichols allegedly shouted a call to arms into a bullhorn: “If you have a weapon, you need to get your weapon!”

His trial is set to begin in July.

The Post continues:

A Cheney representative decried the party’s position, reiterating her statement last week that Republicans were “hostage” to former president Donald Trump.

In a party that continues to embrace Trump, Cheney and Kinzinger have stood out as among the few congressional Republicans to denounce the former president’s actions. Joining them on Friday was Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), who criticized the RNC in a tweet.

“Shame falls on a party that would censure persons of conscience, who seek truth in the face of vitriol,” Romney said. “Honor attaches to Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for seeking truth even when doing so comes at great personal cost.”

[A]nother Trump critic in the GOP, Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, said in a tweet: “The GOP I believe in is the party of freedom and truth, [Since when?] It’s a sad day for my party — and the country — when you’re punished just for expressing your beliefs, standing on principle, and refusing to tell blatant lies.”

So a few tweets from a handful of Republicans is the only opposition to the RNC resolution? They should leave the Republican Party now and start a new conservative opposition party to the Party (cult) of Trump.

The Washington Post editorializes, The Republican Party formally declares that truth is fiction and patriots are traitors:

The Republican Party on Friday took an official stand — against truth and democracy. At the Republican National Committee’s winter meeting in Salt Lake City, party leaders censured Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and moved to aid her primary opponent, Harriet Hageman, who is former president Donald Trump’s preferred candidate for Wyoming’s lone congressional seat.

The Orwellian censure resolution accuses Ms. Cheney and fellow GOP dissident Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) of engaging in behavior “destructive to the institution of the U.S. House of Representatives, the Republican Party and our republic.” Her transgression? Co-leading the House committee investigating the Capitol invasion, an act of political violence Mr. Trump inspired when he was a sitting president charged with protecting the nation from enemies foreign and domestic. The investigation, the censure resolution claimed, is “a Democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse.”

When in recent memory has the House been more threatened as when members had to barricade the doors to the chamber against a dangerous mob screaming for their blood? By insisting on a full probe and accountability for one of the country’s lowest moments since the Civil War, Ms. Cheney is waging what, within her party, is an increasingly lonely battle against those seeking to pervert the U.S. system of government for personal gain.

Over the past year, Republican leaders have chosen a different course, putting in their lot with the insurrectionists. Since Jan. 6, 2021, senior party officials have gone from acknowledging Mr. Trump’s guilt to punishing those, such as Ms. Cheney, who continue to speak up about a tragedy that no American should forget. It remains to be seen what punishment former vice president Mike Pence will endure following a Friday speech in which he rebuked Mr. Trump’s claims that he could have overturned the election on Jan. 6.Republicans assailing Ms. Cheney and siding with Mr. Trump and his lies about the 2020 election are the ones who imperil the republic. By asserting, as their censure resolution did Friday, that truth is fiction and patriots are turncoats, they have exposed the dark, festering core of what their party is becoming: an unruly revolt against fact and reason that betrays the principles leaders, such as former president Ronald Reagan, championed.

Many Republicans want to focus on other issues, such as inflation, the economy and how to run schools during the covid-19 pandemic, hoping that voters will forget Jan. 6 and hand them the House majority in this year’s midterm elections. Ms. Cheney refused to let them change the subject. She rightly believes commitment to democracy should override partisan allegiances and that policy preferences on issues stand insignificant next to commitment to the constitutional order.

Republicans have started their election year by revealing what they really stand for. Voters must remember this moment in November.

Do you stand with the defenders of American democracy? Or do you stand with the authoritarian fascist party of the mob in thrall to the personality cult of Donald Trump? This is the touchstone issue in the 2022 election. You are either a patriot defending American democracy, or you are a traitor to your country who would end American democracy in favor of a fascist dictatorship under a sociopath criminal, Donald Trump.

The current abomination of the Republican Party must be defeated at every level of elected office from president all the way down ballot to dog catcher. A true American patriot cannot in good conscience ever cast a vote for any of today’s anti-democracy Republicans.