Aug.28

electoral-vote.com

Dem 47

   

GOP 53

The Republican Party Has Six Wings

Most things that fly have two or four wings. The modern Republican Party manages to fly even though it has six wings. The only reason it hasn't crashed and burned so far is the gravitational force of Donald Trump, which holds all the pieces together due to force of personality. Whether anyone else can pull that trick off when he has exited stage right remains to be seen.

The Washington Post has a nice rundown of the six-winged beast and who hangs out in each wing. Here is a brief summary:

• MAGA Populists: These are the true believers who powered Trump to two presidencies. They are working class, anti-immigration, and against getting involved in foreign wars. They support tariffs, thinking that will bring jobs home. They consume a lot of right-wing media (e.g., Fox). They hate the "elites" and "deep state" and are angry that Trump is protecting them by not releasing the Epstein files. They are open to courting unions and raising taxes on the rich. Leaders include J.D. Vance, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), and Steve Bannon.
  
  
• Traditional Republicans: Yup, they are not in ascendency at the moment, but they are still around, especially at the state level. They are most definitely not interested in courting unions or raising taxes on the rich. They support free markets and free trade, lower taxes on the rich, and smaller government (except the military). They strongly oppose tariffs. They don't care much about the social issues, but they will just tag along to stay in power. Projecting American power worldwide is fine with them. Leaders here are Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R-VA), Gov. Brian Kemp (R-GA) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD). Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) also belongs in this bag but to call him a leader is stretching the term to its breaking point.
  
  
• Small-government Conservatives and Fiscal Hawks: These are the leftovers from the Tea Party Movement. Their big issue is the budget deficit. They want balanced budgets or surpluses to pay down the federal debt. Leaders here are Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Rand Paul (R-KY) and Ron DeSantis. Some people have forgotten, but DeSantis was a founding member of the Freedom Caucus.
  
  
• The Religious Right: It took Trump's political genius to win over this group. After all, people who are deeply religious tend not to cling to church-avoiding, twice-divorced sexual harassers who have affairs with porn stars while married to a former nude model. But Trump has them locked up, largely because while they spend Sunday praising Jesus, they spend the other 6 days of the week hating gay people and trying to ban all abortions. Trump figured this out quickly and changed his positions to accommodate them. It worked. His Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, and for this they will be forever grateful. Leaders include Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), Sen. James Lankford (R-OK), Republican strategist Ralph Reed, and anti-abortion activist Marjorie Dannenfelser.
  
  
• Tech Right: Tech people used to be either leftist or libertarian, but Trump has brought some of them into the fold. They care about AI, crypto, free speech, and getting the government to keep its dirty paws off their wonderful platforms. They strongly favor allowing skilled immigrants from India and China into the country because it allows them to depress salaries. Leaders include Elon Musk, Marc Andreessen, and David Sacks.
  
  
• MAHA and Former Democrats: These are former conservative Democrats who didn't like it when, in their view, the Democrats went full-blown woke. Some fitness influencers and anti-Big Ag people are in this wing. The leader is Robert Kennedy Jr., but former Democratic presidential candidate and possible Russian asset Tulsi Gabbard also belongs here.
  

It is worth mentioning that the 2025 Republicans are not the first party to house multiple competing and mutually antagonistic factions. The 1932 Democratic coalition under Franklin Delano Roosevelt had very progressive professors at Harvard, racist rednecks in the South, prairie farmers in the Midwest, libertarian ranchers in the West, and businessmen in New York and Chicago. Each group hated all the others. It was FDR's genius that held it all together. His veep, Harry Truman, held it together for one more election (1948), then it fell apart and Dwight D. Eisenhower won in 1952. What happens to the Republican Party in the post-Trump era is a very good question to which we do not have a very good answer. (V)