Groundhog Day isn’t for another month but if you were watching cable news over the past few days you certainly had a feeling of deja vu watching all the footage of the January 6th insurrection again and being reminded of the violence and horror of that day. It is still as shocking as it was three years ago. And yet we are about to embark on a replay of the election that brought is to that awful moment and it feels as if nothing has changed in our politics at all.
Three years ago at this time we were still reeling from the global pandemic that was still taking lives by the tens of thousands and stunned by what had transpired after the election. There was talk of invoking the 25th Amendment against Trump to get him out of office before the inauguration and the congress was considering impeaching him for the second time, mostly in order to prevent him from ever running again. Staunch Trump supporters like then House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy and S. Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham stood up to denounce Trump and there was a very strong sense that the camels back had finally, finally been broken.
But everyone should have known better because even after the events of that momentous day, 147 House Republicans came back into the chamber that night and voted to overturn the election results. And as for the impeachment, despite Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell reportedly telling his aides, “The Democrats are going to take care of the son of a b—- for us. If this isn’t impeachable, I don’t know what is,” the Senate Republicans couldn’t muster the 10 more votes they needed to get the two thirds needed to convict.
So here we are. Unless something highly unexpected happens we are facing a rematch between Donald Trump and Joe Biden next November. And the current polling shows that it is very close so unless Donald Trump wins it, I think we can probably expect more disruption and violence just as we did three years ago. It’s as if the whole political system has been frozen in that moment and we’re right back where we started.
Last time we had one of the weirdest presidential campaigns ever with the pandemic causing massive disruptions, with social distancing on the rational Democratic side and super spreader events from the Trump campaign. And we saw the most bizarre political conventions ever mounted with Republicans flouting all norms, as usual, from public health advisories to the use of the White House and major government monuments to stage it as if it were a royal jubilee while the Democrats held theirs outdoors in a parking lot.
And we’re not going back to normal this time. Trump’s assault on democracy has never been resolved so we shall have the bizarre spectacle of a presumptive nominee of the Republican Party under 91 criminal indictments and massive legal problems stemming from his post-election behavior in 2020. Half the campaign may take place inside and outside courthouses. And once again, as it was 24 years ago, a conservative Supreme Court may end up being the deciding factor.
This weekend we had a chance to see the outlines of how the campaign will likely unfold and the contrast has never been clearer. On Friday President Biden gave what many observers called one of the best speeches of his career, appearing at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania to mark January 6th and lay out the stakes in the election. He said, “Today we’re here to answer the most important of questions: Is democracy still America’s sacred cause? It’s what the 2024 election is all about.”
He made clear that he was at Valley Forge to evoke George Washington’s decision to only serve two terms and peacefully hand over the reins of power, establishing one of the bedrocks of American democracy, which Donald Trump upended when he couldn’t bear to admit he lost. And he contrasted his statesmanship with Donald Trump of whom he said, “he still doesn’t understand a basic truth, and that is you can’t love your country only when you win.” And he exhorted the voters to cling to reality and ensure that he doesn’t have a chance to do it again:
“When the attack on January 6th happened, there was no doubt about the truth. As time has gone on, politics, fear, money — all have intervened. And now these MAGA voices who know the truth about Trump on January 6th have abandoned the truth and abandoned democracy. They made their choice. Now the rest of us — Democrats, independents, mainstream Republicans — we have to make our choice.”
Donald Trump stumped in Iowa all weekend, counting down to the primary there in less than two weeks. He made many many, many incoherent and daft statements and lied flagrantly about Biden stuttering through his Valley Forge speech. (He also took a shot at the late Senator John McCain’s disability, suffered when he was tortured as a prisoner of war.) In other words he was his usual childish, bullying self which is what his followers love about him.
But he also talked about January 6th and the 2020 election at each stop.
He also claimed that the FBI “led the charge” that day and repeatedly asserted that those who staged the insurrection did so “peacefully and patriotically” virtually demanding that people believe him rather than their own eyes. And, as it happens, many people do. The latest Washington Post poll found that only 18% of respondents said they were “mostly violent” and 72% of Republicans think “too much is being made of the storming” of the Capitol.
So, the battle lines have been drawn. On the anniversary of January 6th, the two presumptive nominees for president gave speeches. President Biden told the truth, reminding the country of what really happened. He asked that Americans recognize the threat that another Donald Trump presidency presents to all of us. And Donald Trump continued to lie, even more brazenly than he did then, once again insisting that he actually won the 2020 election and exhorting his followers to “finish the job.”
Those words hold true for the rest of us as well. It’s time to end this stand-off once and for all.