“Justice for J6” was a flop — but the Jan. 6 insurrection has fueled growing support for white extremist violence
Trump’s Republican-fascists and their propagandists have elevated these hooligans, vandals and (in many cases) terrorists to the status of martyrs and patriots as a way of legitimizing their anti-democratic movement, creating sympathy among Trump’s faithful that can be exploited for fundraising and, of course, recruiting and encouraging more extremists to the cause.
Despite warnings from the Capitol Police, DHS and other authorities that more violence was possible, the rally on Sept. 18 was a tame and peaceful affair. No more than a few hundred Trump cultists attended, greatly outnumbered by law enforcement and the news media. This low turnout was widely mocked among the chattering class, liberals and progressives of the “resistance” and others who oppose Trump and his movement.
As I have argued before, such reactions are shortsighted and ill-advised — another example among many of the way America’s political class, news media and the public at large still does not understand the nature of the threat they face from the Republican-fascist movement and the larger white right.