Communist Party USA
Trump & Co. had a five-point plan to undo the presidential election and overthrow the government. They sought to: Discredit and challenge state results (particularly in PA, GA, and AZ) Recruit the Department of Justice Draft Mike Pence Subvert the January 6th vote count Toss the election to the House of Representatives The mob that stormed the Capitol on that fateful day in January was the spear’s edge of the assault. The main features of these chilling designs are described in Peril, by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa. It could have worked. And would have worked had the ever-loyal, browbeaten vice president succumbed and been “brave” as Trump had pressured him to by unilaterally declaring invalid Electoral College votes, at one point proffering a “wouldn’t-it-be-cool-to-have-that-kind-of-power” temptation. As proposed in a now infamous how-to memo on overthrowing the government devised by Trump lawyer John Eastman, the election, then, would have been decided in the House where the GOP holds a slim margin in state delegations. Such an action would have undoubtedly precipitated a constitutional crisis with hitherto unthinkable consequences, including the employment of the Insurrection Act, martial law, and worse — a scenario adhering closely to the communist movement’s classic description of a key element in fascism’s ascent to power — the substitution of one state form of government by another. “The accession to power of fascism is not an ordinary succession of one bourgeois government by another, but a substitution of one state form of class domination of the bourgeoisie — bourgeois democracy — by another form — open terrorist dictatorship,” wrote Georgi Dimitrov in his United Front: The Struggle against Fascism and War. Those who continue to think the fascist danger overblown or mask it in classless, “authoritarian,” and “white nationalist” vagaries, would do well to consider that some closest to the process, while late in sounding the alarm, had no such misgivings about terminology. Why is this important? Because in battle, it’s vital to know who you’re fighting against and on what terrain to engage them. “Authoritarian white nationalism,” a bourgeois liberal term if there ever was one, tells us nothing about the class and social forces behind the Trump counterrevolution, in other words, who is footing the bills and pulling the strings. Fascism, on the other hand, as defined in Marxist terms points to banking and other capital as the chief culprits. With respect to understanding what’s at stake, the alarmed Democratic Whip Jim Clyburn is described in Peril as “studying up on fascist histories with a focus on Italy. He saw Trump as America’s Benito Mussolini in waiting.” The book also relates a story told by Congressman Adam Smith of Washington State. Smith, who chairs the House Armed Services Committee, enjoyed the unhappy experience of boarding a commercial flight home filled with January 6th insurrectionists, several of whom spoke openly about something called 6MWE (6 million were not enough). Smith also shared the experience with Joint Chiefs chair Mark Milley in a phone conversation on January 8th. He later told colleagues, “My fear with Trump was always that he was going to engineer a fascist takeover of the country.” After January 6th, Milley, who later apologized after donning battle fatigues and joining Trump in the infamous Bible-toting walk across a Lafayette Square cleared by force, compiled a list of several fascist organizations that presented a clear and present danger to the Republic. On the list were 6MWE, Extreme Tea Party, QAnon, Patriot Movement, We the People Movement, Nazis, Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, NewsMax, and Epoch Times. As Woodward and Costa write: “Some were the new…
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It’s not over: Woodward’s “Peril” tells us why