MAGAlaise

Fissures among MAGA are boiling over this week. Let's hope this malaise doesn't last.

It is hard to believe that barely one year ago, Joe Biden self-immolated on a debate stage in Atlanta. His cringeworthy meltdown set off a chain of events that led to the most dramatic—and exciting—presidential election in U.S. history.

What transpired after the evening of June 27, 2024 is a timeline even the best fiction writer could not have imagined. A near-fatal assassination attempt against Donald Trump; the replacement of Biden with Kamala Harris; another assassination attempt against Trump.

The Supreme Court mostly ruled in Trump’s favor on the question of presidential immunity from criminal prosecution related to Special Counsel Jack Smith’s January 6 indictment. A few weeks later, a Florida judge dismissed the other federal indictment brought by Smith in the so-called classified documents case.

The richest man in the world, once an icon of the Left, endorsed Trump and hit the campaign trail in energetic fashion.

Every day created a rollercoaster-like atmosphere—and ended with the greatest political comeback in U.S history when Donald Trump, written off for the political dead, decisively won the presidency. A story, those of us on the winning side still boast, we’ll one day tell our children and grandchildren.

But that wasn’t the end of the grand story.

Too Good to Be True—or Last

Republicans won the House and the Senate. Early cabinet picks indicated Trump 47 would look nothing like Trump 45; rather than fill his White House with Beltway lifers recommended by other Beltway lifers, Trump this time selected hardcore MAGA loyalists to populate his administration. The emboldened MAGA movement signaled playbook efforts to submarine controversial picks would not be tolerated.

In an ironic twist, the president took the oath of office in the very building Democrats, the media, and many members of his own party insisted was the scene of an “insurrection” that he allegedly incited on January 6, 2021.

After Inauguration Day, Trump issued a series of executive orders, many of which settled scores with those who tried to destroy him including Democratic tied law firms. He pardoned J6ers. The directives also attempted to undo the incalculable damage Joe Biden—or someone under his name—inflicted on the country over the course of four years, particularly policies on climate change, DEI, and transgenderism.

The MAGA movement was on a bender, a high that surpassed Trump’s surprise victory in 2016.

A Temporary Letdown or Permanent Hangover?

But reality quickly sunk in. Republicans in Congress, particularly the Senate, gave off first term Trump vibes. Federal judges appointed by Republican and Democratic presidents unofficially declared their role as the new Trump resistance, sabotaging even the most common sense initiatives such as deporting illegal Venezuelans tied to a dangerous South American crime racket or halting gender “reassignment” therapies for federal inmates.

The national news media set its collective sights on Elon Musk, who volunteered to oversee a wide ranging operation identifying hundreds of billions in wasteful and even corrupt government spending, which prompted public backlash that threatened his personal safety and business empire. The promise of the Department of Government Efficiency, fully embraced by the MAGA base, became bogged down in bad press and litigation. Musk and Trump then endured a nasty, if temporary, breakup.

Fissures within the MAGA base quickly developed—in my opinion, unreasonably so—when the new leadership at the Department of Justice and FBI did not immediately start perp-walking the biggest Trump villains, despite aggressive house cleaning at both agencies beginning on day one. (Publicity stunts about the so-called Epstein files did not help.) Impatient for retribution for the lawfare against the president, his allies, and his voters, influential corners of the MAGA social media space even ludicrously suggested DOJ and FBI leadership were somehow compromised.

More recently, the president sent mixed messages about the deportation of illegals, an issue that perhaps more than any other got him elected. After stating he would revisit the removal of illegals working in hospitality and agriculture, an announcement that resulted in swift backlash on MAGA social media, Trump relented. (Luckily, Democrats are jumping the shark on a daily basis by attacking law enforcement and confronting administration officials in defense of those here illegally.)

But nothing appears to threaten the cohesiveness of the Trump coalition like Israel’s ongoing strikes against Iran. The conflict, and potential U.S. involvement, is pitting longtime Trump allies such as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Steve Bannon, and Tucker Carlson against the president, Congressional Republicans, and media/social media influencers who won’t rule out engagement of some sort. After Carlson publicly warned participating in the war could “effectively end Trump’s presidency,” the president described Carlson, who campaigned for Trump last year, as “kooky.”

And of course this is all music to the media’s ears.

Now, there’s not too much harm in a little name-calling among friends; disagreement is necessary to keep any political movement sharp and nimble. And this is less a trust issue with the president and more a matter of deja vu—or PTSD, take your pick—from the GOP’s neocon days.

However, there is a real possibility the current finger pointing could develop into long term fractures beyond repair—which endangers the widely agreed-upon agenda of America First.

A letdown after a high, especially a high of this magnitude, is expected. But an extended hangover does no one any good.