WASHINGTON (AP) — Embracing Donald Trump’s strategy of criticizing the U.S. judicial system after a historic conviction, Republicans in Congress are eagerly joining his campaign of revenge and political revenge as the Republican Party runs to retake the White House.
Few Republican officials have argued that Trump should not be the party’s presidential candidate in the November election. In fact, some tried to hasten his nomination. Few people dared defend the legitimacy of the New York state court that tried the silencing case or the 12 jurors who returned the unanimous verdict.
And Republicans who have expressed doubts about Trump’s innocence or political viability, including Trump’s former hawkish national security adviser John Bolton and Senate candidate Larry Hogan of Maryland, have been immediately harassed by the former president’s executors and told to “leave the party.” ” I heard.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican, said she would vote for Trump whether he was a free man or a prisoner of the Biden administration.
She also posted an upside-down American flag that has come to symbolize the ‘Stop the Steal’ movement that President Trump launched with allies before the attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.
The rapid, powerful, and deepening devotion to Trump despite his felony convictions demonstrates how completely Republican leaders and lawmakers have become indoctrinated with baseless complaints about a “rigged” system and the dangerous machinations of a “weaponized” government. It shows whether it is being used in an attack against . Joe Biden and the Democratic Party.
Instead of shunning Trump’s increasingly authoritarian language or ensuring they will provide checks and balances for a second term, Republican senators and representatives are seeking to upend long-standing trust in American governance and what to do if Trump returns to power. We are laying the groundwork for what we plan to do.
On Friday, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan of Ohio called on prosecutors Alvin Bragg and Matthew Colangelo to appear at a June hearing on the “weaponization of the federal government” and Trump’s “unprecedented political prosecution.” As president, Biden has no authority over New York state courts.
“What we are preparing for is that if Trump wins, he will use the state apparatus to target his political opponents.” said Jason Stanley, a Yale professor and author of “How Fascism Works.”
Stanley said history is full of examples of people who don’t believe the rhetoric of authoritarianism. “Believe what they say,” he said. “He is literally saying he will use the machinery of the state to target his political opponents.”
At Trump Tower in New York on Friday, the former president returned to attacks he had repeatedly made in his campaign speeches, describing Biden as “corrupt” and the United States as a “fascist” country.
President Trump called members of the bipartisan House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol “thugs” and said Biden was the “Manchurian Candidate,” inspired by 1960s films depicting puppets of America’s political enemies.
The Trump campaign memo includes a suggestion that Republicans call the case a “hoax,” a “hoax,” a “witch hunt,” “election interference,” and a “law” designed by Biden. This was called ‘perverse’.
Biden has not faced such charges, and House Republican efforts to impeach the president over his son Hunter Biden’s business dealings have largely stalled. Hunter Biden is scheduled to appear in court next week on unrelated gun charges in Wilmington, Delaware.
“It’s reckless, dangerous and irresponsible to say this was rigged just because you don’t like the verdict,” Joe Biden said Friday.
Asked later at the White House if something like this could happen to him, Biden said: “Not at all. I didn’t do anything wrong. The system still works.”
In response to President Trump’s claims, the Democratic president claimed that the incident was being organized for the purpose of harming him politically, but Biden quipped, “I didn’t know I was such a powerful person.”
In a hush-money case, Trump was found guilty of attempting to influence the 2016 election by forging and paying pornographic actors to bury stories of his infidelity. He faces three other felony charges, including a federal lawsuit over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. But their opinions are unlikely to be heard before the presidential rematch with Biden, expected in November.
Thursday’s ruling comes after a jury in 2023 found Trump responsible for the sexual abuse of advice columnist E. Gene Carroll. A judge in a 2024 business fraud case ruled that Trump had lied about his wealth for years and ordered him to pay a whopping $355 million. Being punished.
Republicans in Congress, who are almost human, have provided Trump with the only voice.
“Fox & Friends” chairman Mike Johnson amplified claims, without evidence, that Democrats are trying to hurt Trump. Johnson, R-La., said he believes the Supreme Court should step in to resolve the case.
“I know many of the justices on the court personally, and I think they have the same deep concerns about this issue as we do,” Johnson said.
Outgoing Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said he expected Trump to win the hush-money lawsuit on appeal. But the three senators seeking to replace McConnell as leader echoed Trump’s words with stronger criticism of the judicial system.
South Dakota Senator John Thune said the incident was “politically motivated.” Texas Sen. John Cornyn called the ruling “a disgrace.” Sen. Rick Scott of Florida said anyone who calls themselves a party leader should stand up and condemn “illegal election interference.”
Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins, known as a bipartisan leader, said prosecutors “charged precisely because of who the defendant was, not because of the specific criminal activity.”
With sentencing in the hush money case expected in July before the Republican National Convention, Texas Republican Rep. Chip Roy said the Republican Party should move up the convention to speed up the nomination of President Trump as the party’s presidential candidate.
Republican judicial advocate Mike Davis, a former Senate aide who has been mentioned for a position in the incoming Trump administration, circulated a letter outlining next steps.
“Dear Republicans,” he said in a post Friday. If their response to a guilty verdict is “we must respect the process” or “we are too principled to retaliate,” he suggested two things. One was an insult, and the other was “Leave the party.”
Rutaj Senator Mike Lee circulated his letter claiming it was the White House that was making a “mockery” of the rule of law and changing politics in “un-American” ways. He and other senators threatened to halt Senate work until Republicans took action.
Rep. Lee said, “Those who turned our judicial system into a political cudgel must be held accountable.”
Associated Press writers Michelle L. Price, Ali Swenson and Chris Megerian contributed to this article.
