Chuck Darwin<p>Trump is scheduled to appear this week at the so-called 🔸People’s Convention,🔸<br>”a conference organized by Turning Point Action, a political action committee headed by Trump sycophant Charlie <a href="https://c.im/tags/Kirk" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Kirk</span></a>, who has recently come under fire for a series of racist remarks. </p><p>The usual assortment of Trumpists are on the bill: Donald Trump Jr., South Dakota Gov. Kristi <a href="https://c.im/tags/Noem" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Noem</span></a>, Vivek <a href="https://c.im/tags/Ramaswamy" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Ramaswamy</span></a>, Lara <a href="https://c.im/tags/Trump" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Trump</span></a>, Roger <a href="https://c.im/tags/Stone" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Stone</span></a>, Kimberly <a href="https://c.im/tags/Guilfoyle" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Guilfoyle</span></a>, and Steve <a href="https://c.im/tags/Bannon" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Bannon</span></a> (assuming he’s not in prison). </p><p>Also listed as a speaker is Candace <a href="https://c.im/tags/Owens" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Owens</span></a>, who left the right-wing Daily Caller after coming under fire for promoting antisemitic notions. </p><p>She also has denied Covid existed and apparently excused <a href="https://c.im/tags/Hitler" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Hitler</span></a>, saying, <br>“If Hitler just wanted to make Germany great and have things run well — OK, fine.” <br>She has questioned whether dinosaurs “roamed the earth until a great big meteor hit.” </p><p>Once upon a time, it would have been notable—and not recommended—for a presidential candidate to be hosted by a racist like Kirk or share the stage with such a fringe player as Owens. <br>Not anymore.</p><p>Now let’s dive a little deeper. </p><p>A month after the “People’s Convention,” Kirk’s Turning Point USA is holding <br>🔸The Believers Summit🔸in West Palm Beach, Florida, not far from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club. </p><p>Its aim is to deploy “biblical truths” to “counteract ‘woke’ narratives” and “to facilitate a God-breathed transformation in our nation.” </p><p>Speakers include David <a href="https://c.im/tags/Barton" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Barton</span></a>, who, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, has “long promoted the idea, now widely popular among the religious right, that the Founding Fathers never intended the separation of church and state but instead sought to construct a Christian nation.” </p><p>Also on the bill is John <a href="https://c.im/tags/Amanchukwu" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Amanchukwu</span></a>, a North Carolina pastor who preached against the Raleigh school district’s diversity and equality program, claiming it was “grooming children to be the next pervert.” <br>And then there’s Doug <a href="https://c.im/tags/Wilson" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Wilson</span></a>.</p><p>Wilson is a leading Christian nationalist on the right. <br>In a 1996 monograph titled <br>🔹“Southern Slavery, As It Was” 🔹that he co-wrote, he observed, “Slavery as it existed in the South…was a relationship based upon mutual affection and confidence.” </p><p>He added, "There has never been a multiracial society which has existed with such mutual intimacy and harmony in the history of the world.” </p><p>And there’s more: "Slave life was to [slaves] a life of plenty, of simple pleasures, of food, clothes, and good medical care." </p><p>His publishing house published a book in 2023 that, as Reason magazine put it, “advocates an ethnically uniform nation ruled by a 💥Christian prince💥with the power to punish blasphemy and false religion.” </p><p>The author, not surprisingly, had a history of associating with white supremacists. </p><p>Wilson promoted the book on an appearance with Tucker <a href="https://c.im/tags/Carlson" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Carlson</span></a>. <br>He has also called for women to submit to male authority, especially in the bedroom, noting that the lack of such submission can lead to rape.</p><p>Wilson told Carlson, “As a Christian, I would like that national structure to conform to the thing that God wants, and not the thing that man wants. <br>That’s Christian nationalism.” </p><p>But it’s the thing that God wants as Wilson interprets it. <br>That’s fundamentalism. </p><p>In an interview in February with the Religious News Service, he envisioned 🔸a Christian republic🔸 in which people who embrace “loopy-heresy” would be barred from public office. </p><p>His dream world included a global alliance of Christian states that would exclude any nation that permits same-sex marriage or abortion.</p><p>So Trump associates with and legitimizes Kirk, <br>who has recently made racist remarks and who provides a pulpit for Wilson, <br>a Christian supremacist and somewhat of a slavery apologist. </p><p>For decades, there’s been an ugly swamp of bigotry, hatred, and intolerance on the right. </p><p>Republicans have often played footsie with its denizens. (See my book American Psychosis: A Historical Investigation of How the Republican Party Went Crazy, which, alas, remains far too relevant these days.) </p><p>But Trump has enthusiastically leaped into this muck, bear-hugging and elevating extremists and miscreants. </p><p>And he seems poised to welcome them into a Trump 2.0 administration. </p><p>This ain’t a secret. <br>But it practically might as well be, if the media and the Democrats don’t tell the story of this ongoing crusade loudly and often. <br><a href="https://link.motherjones.com/public/35671544" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" translate="no" target="_blank"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">link.motherjones.com/public/35</span><span class="invisible">671544</span></a></p>