Donald Trump’s approach to peaceful American protesters has long reflected a president uncomfortable with dissent. Indeed, the Republican has spent years trying to delegitimize dissenters, urging the public to see his detractors as “paid protesters,” as if his opponents are inherently inauthentic.
But that’s not all he’s said. In June, Trump announced that anyone who dared to protest a military parade he was excited about would be met with “very heavy force.” A month earlier, he said Americans “are allowed to protest,” but only in ways he deems “reasonable.”
Responding to a conservative reporter who said that anti-war protesters near the White House “still have their First Amendment right,” the president replied last month, “Yeah, well, I’m not so sure.”
But when it comes to GOP attitudes related to Americans and their right to public dissent, the problem isn’t limited to the man in the Oval Office. Politico reported late last week:
Speaker Mike Johnson on Friday slammed the No Kings protest march scheduled to take place at the National Mall [on Oct. 18], describing the planned protest as the ‘hate America rally’ that would draw ‘the pro-Hamas wing’ and ‘the antifa people.’ His characterizations, however, drew condemnation from some Democrats who defended the protest movement, whose first big demonstration was overwhelmingly peaceful.
Hours after the Louisiana Republican made those comments on Fox News, he doubled down on the rhetoric during comments to reporters on Capitol Hill, referring to No Kings gathering as a “hate-America rally.”
Johnson had plenty of company. House Majority Whip Tom Emmer on Friday also told reporters that the scheduled protest should be seen as a “hate-America rally,” adding that the gathering is being championed by “the terrorist wing” of the Democratic Party.
For good measure, Republican Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas apparently received similar talking points, telling Newsmax that the progressive event will feature “agitators,” whom he doubts will remain peaceful. The far-right senator added that he wanted National Guard troops to be in place for the protest in Washington. (There will be related events in many other locations nationwide.)
The ferocity of the pushback wasn’t exactly subtle. In fact, the more Republican rhetoric about the No Kings events turns hysterical, the easier it is to believe that the party is increasingly worried about the growing public backlash to the GOP agenda.
Just as notably, let’s not forget that a benchmark of any authoritarian movement is the delegitimization of political opposition. Insisting that patriots gathering to express concern about their nation’s future are attending a “hate-America rally” checks all the wrong boxes. But let’s also not forget that Republican officials have spent recent weeks vowing a crackdown on progressive activism that they deem dangerous to public safety. Last month, Trump designated antifa as a “major terrorist organization,” notwithstanding the fact there is no such organization, and we soon after discussed an unsettling dynamic: If the White House says that antifa members are terrorists, and the White House says it will decide on its own who and what qualifies as “antifa” affiliates, this can get very scary, very quickly. Weeks later, GOP leaders started telling Americans that a peaceful demonstration by Americans will draw “the antifa people,” and that “the terrorist wing” of the Democratic Party is involved in the gathering. There have already been too many recent instances in which those in positions of power have tried to stifle dissent. There’s no reason to believe, however, that things won’t get worse.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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