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Is a fascist movement developing here?
Since the media declared that former Vice President Joe Biden won the presidential election, the nation has witnessed a proliferation of right-wing Trump rallies. Their message: the election was a fraud and Trump’s win was stolen from him.
Is this the beginning of a domestic fascist movement to discredit our democratic institutions? Historian Timothy Snyder in his book “On Tyranny” argues that institutions preserve our decency. They do not protect themselves. They fall if citizens do not protect them.
The Trump-appointed Director of Cybersecurity, Chris Krebs, was fired because he announced the vote across the nation “was the most secure in American history.” Krebs has since filed a lawsuit charging that Trump has initiated a campaign of intimidation, retaliation and threats against Republicans.
Those are the Republicans who as state officials administered their election efforts. Trump attacked them for refusing to back up his unsubstantiated claims of massive election fraud. The national leadership of the Republican Party did not step forward to protect them. They were silent.
Trump, as president of our democratic republic, should be our national leader in citizenship. Instead, he has repeatedly refused to recognize that every judge he has asked to overthrow Biden’s victory, including judges he…
