The moving goal posts

Who knows whether Trump will seek a third term, but the conservatives saying he won't will fall in line if he does.

Credit: Getty images

Donald Trump, Steve Bannon, and some of the president’s backers are making claims that he will run for a third term. I don’t know if he will or not, but I do know that, if he does, all the Republicans saying today that he’s constitutionally barred from serving again will make excuses for why they are supporting him in 2028. The GOP is the party of moving goal posts. What they say today has little connection with what they do tomorrow.

Their loss of ideals and sense of shame began in Trump’s first term. People like Lindsey Graham, Marco Rubio, and even J.D. Vance recognized the dangers Trump poised to movement conservatism but abandoned their values to fall in line. Before bending a knee, they called out Trump as a liar, conman, and grifter. Trump has not changed. They have. They’ve shamelessly abandoned their values for political gain.

When Trump lost the election in 2020, his supporters insisted he would accept defeat. When he didn’t, they initially called him out. Everybody from Mitch McConnell to Kevin McCarthy blamed Trump for the assault on the Capitol. Conservative columnist Erick Erickson referred to the attackers as “insurrectionists” and laid the blame on Trump. “For two months,” he wrote in an op-ed on January 11, 2020, “The president, various talking heads, news networks, pundits, grifters, charlatans and conmen perpetuated a lie.”

Today, Erickson claims the left is overreacting to January 6. Like Graham, McCarthy, Rubio, and so many other Republicans, Erickson showed that tribalism trumps truth in the modern GOP, spectacularly contradicting himself yet paying no price in credibility.

While Republican leaders had slowly been compromising their values during the first Trump administration, January 6 is when they wholesale abandoned their conservative values, patriotism, and honor. When Congressional Republicans decided not to hold Trump accountable for his actions, they set the stage for a comeback devoid of the guardrails that constrained him during his first term. It’s been stunning to see how easily they shed the beliefs that drove them during the past forty years or so.

Today, they support a tariff regime after four decades of promoting free markets. The House and Senate, both controlled by Republicans, have surrendered not only their authority to oversee trades deals, but their commitment to the principle of free markets. When the Senate voted this week to reject Trump’s 50% tariff on Brazil, only five Republicans voted with Democrats to rebuke the president.

After harshly condemning Joe Biden for pardoning his son, Republicans are silent about Trump apparently selling pardons to the highest bidder. He pardoned every January 6 defendant despite several with extensive criminal histories. He’s created a business for friendly lobbyists who charge their clients millions for help in securing pardons. No telling how much is finding its way into the Trump machine but you can bet its a lot.

Last week, Trump pardoned a billionaire whose company, Binance, was laundering money for “terrorists, hackers, and human traffickers.” Binance has been promoting the Trump family crypto business, helping them make millions of dollars.

Not that long ago, combatting corruption was a bipartisan endeavor. Today, Republicans openly acknowledge and excuse Trump’s selling off the White House because, as GOP Congressman James Comer put it, “they’re admitting they’re doing this.” So if Hunter Biden had merely admitted that he was making money off of his relationship with his father, the GOP would have been cool with it. Right.

And of course there are the Epstein files. The GOP made releasing the files a major campaign issue. Back then, the base thought they were full of Democrats and GOP Members of Congress were fine with their release. Once they realized that Donald Trump and some of his allies are likely named, they quickly moved to keep them closed. Human trafficking is bad until the Trump family is involved. Then, it’s worth a coverup.

I can go on. The abandonment of NATO, the shady deals with the United Arab Emirates, usurping states’ rights, etcetera, etcetera. Republicans don’t know what they believe until Trump tells them. So when he’s hinting at running for a third term, take him seriously. All the people on the right saying he’s not serious will fall in line if he actually does it.

They’re the same people who said he would accept a peaceful transfer of power. They are the people who called themselves free market conservatives. They are the ones who touted personal responsibility and accountability. They are the ones who have abandoned almost everything they held sacred not too long ago. They are the ones constantly moving the goal posts to make sure their beliefs line up with Donald Trump’s interests.

They are not worth the debate. What they say today may be worthless tomorrow. If they still had shame, they would be embarrassed.