The Republicans/MAGA 2025

MAGA Isn’t Stupid
It’s difficult, but essential, to distinguish this authoritarian cult from “stupidity.”
MAGA is endlessly exasperating. It’s cruel. It’s performative. It’s hypocritical to the point of nihilism. It’s antisocial. It’s thuggish. But it’s also the most successful authoritarian movement of the 21st century. Consider its dramatic accomplishments in the single disastrous decade from 2015-2025: Reducing the United States from a leading democratic nation to a prominent member of the authoritarian “axis of evil.” Reversing not just the accomplishments of the Obama Administration, but rolling back American progress in Civil and Voting Rights going back to the 1960s, blunting the global movement for climate remediation and destroying nearly a century of rising prosperity based on the growth of world trade. – ExoProphet: Notes from the Algorithmic Age

9 April
Senate Republicans express relief after Trump pauses tariff plans
(AP) — As news that President Donald Trump was backing down on most of his tariffs reached a luncheon of Senate Republicans Wednesday, the room reacted with relief, cheers and smiles.
It capped an extraordinary 24 hours in Washington in which GOP senators had increasingly confronted the Trump administration with worries about the economic impacts of the president’s sweeping tariff strategy. In Senate hearings and interviews with reporters, GOP skepticism of Trump’s policies had run unusually high, amounting to a rare break with a president they have otherwise championed.
Republicans are going public with their growing worries about Trump’s tariffs
(AP) — Manufacturers struggling to make long-term plans. Farmers facing retaliation from Chinese buyers. U.S. households burdened with higher prices.
Republican senators are confronting the Trump administration with those worries and many more as they fret about the economic impact of the president’s sweeping tariff strategy that went into effect Wednesday.
In a Senate hearing and interviews with reporters this week, Republican skepticism of President Donald Trump’s policies ran unusually high. While GOP lawmakers made sure to direct their concern at Trump’s aides and advisers — particularly U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, who appeared before the Senate Finance Committee Tuesday — it still amounted to a rare Republican break from a president they have otherwise championed.
Ever wary of crossing Trump, Republicans engaged in a delicate two-step of criticizing the rollout of the tariffs then shifting to praise for the president’s economic vision. In the afternoon, Tillis in a Senate floor speech said that the “president is right in challenging other nations who have for decades abused their relationship with the United States,” yet went on to question who in the White House was thinking through the long-term economic effects of the sweeping tariffs.

5 April
US Senate Republicans pass measure to move forward on Trump’s tax cuts
Plunging stock market hovers over fiscal outlook
House Republicans now must weigh Senate’s work
Democrats warn that Medicaid under threat
(Reuters) – The U.S. Senate approved a Republican budget blueprint early on Saturday that aims to extend trillions of dollars worth of President Donald Trump’s 2017 tax cuts and sharply reduce government spending.
Senate Republicans adopted a fiscal blueprint Saturday for President Donald Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill.” –What comes next is anyone’s guess.
(Politico) The Senate voted 51-48 on a budget resolution that unlocks their ability to pass a party-line bill later this year that will combine an overhaul of the tax code with border, energy and defense policies. GOP Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Rand Paul of Kentucky joined all Democrats and independent in opposing the resolution — though other Republicans still have concerns that will need to be addressed before passing the final bill.

Ted Cruz warns of midterm ‘bloodbath’ if Trump tariffs cause a recession
Texas senator’s comments another sign of Republican unease over ‘reciprocal tariffs’ and stock market plunge
(The Guardian) Ted Cruz, the US senator from Texas, has warned that his fellow Republicans risk a “bloodbath” in the 2026 midterm elections if Donald Trump’s “liberation day” tariffs cause a recession.
Cruz also warned that the president’s tariffs, if they stay in place for long and are met by global retaliation on American goods, could trigger a full-blown trade war that “would destroy jobs here at home, and do real damage to the US economy”.
“A hundred years ago, the US economy didn’t have the leverage to have the kind of impact we do now. But I worry, there are voices within the administration that want to see these tariffs continue for ever and ever,” he added.
A scary quote for the GOP on Trump and tariffs
What if Trump is willing to go down with the tariff ship — and take his party with him?
(WaPo) Perhaps the most infamous quote Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) ever offered about Donald Trump came in May 2016.
“If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed,” Graham said, “and we will deserve it.” The Twitter post remains live to this day, nearly nine years later.
Despite Graham’s warning, this marriage of convenience has more or less worked out for him and his fellow Republicans. Trump is now a two-term president, and Republicans control both chambers of Congress.
… Republicans might want to start asking themselves what they do if and when it all blows up — and if Graham’s admonition might ultimately prove right. Because right now Trump is effectively threatening them with potential destruction, with little to no sign that he cares what they think about that.

Trump turmoil renews Jeffries’s hopes for Democrats winning ‘comfortably’
(WaPo) After a rough start for Democrats this year, the minority leader says actions by Trump and Elon Musk are creating an “expanded battlefield” into GOP districts in the 2026 midterms.

1 April
G.O.P. Bolsters House Majority by Retaining Two Seats in Florida
(NYT) The Republicans who were elected on Tuesday to fill seats left empty by Matt Gaetz and Michael Waltz had President Trump’s backing.
Democrats Show a Pulse: 6 Takeaways From Tuesday’s Elections
Energized against the new Trump era, and against Elon Musk, Democrats pulled off a crucial judicial victory in Wisconsin and cut into Republican margins in two Florida congressional races.
On the same night that Judge Susan Crawford, the liberal candidate, was delivering a thumping to Judge Brad Schimel, the Trump-backed conservative, Democrats saw a silver lining in losses in two special congressional elections in Florida. In both races, they were able to cut sharply into the much wider Republican victory margins from November.
In all, the night’s results demonstrated what Democratic officials have been saying in recent weeks: that their voters are fired up to fight back against a Trump administration set on tearing down large chunks of the federal government.