Our 2020 book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good.
Shane Goldmacher and Luke Broadwater at NYT:
A day after Donald J. Trump’s conviction, it quickly became clear that Republicans across the country would not run away from his newfound status as a felon.
They would, instead, run on it.
Echoing Mr. Trump in casting the New York case as a disgraceful sham, Republican candidates and party committees used the first criminal conviction of a former president as a rallying cry — for campaign cash, for congressional hearings and for motivation to vote in November.
Whether they were congressional leaders, potential running mates or onetime rivals, prominent Republicans’ speedy alignment behind Mr. Trump, with little dissent or discussion, was no surprise for a party that has increasingly made displays of Trumpian loyalty a nonnegotiable requirement. But their ready-made outrage was not just about lining up behind the nominee. It was also about basking in the energy of a party base that remains as adhered to Mr. Trump as ever.
“The base has never been more motivated,” said Representative Ronny Jackson of Texas, Mr. Trump’s former doctor in the White House and a close ally.
In a 33-minute speech in the same Trump Tower lobby where he began his first presidential bid nearly nine years ago, Mr. Trump denounced his prosecutors as “sick people” on Friday and criticized the key witness in the case, seeking to pivot his candidacy from the confines of a Manhattan courtroom to the campaign trail.
The Trump campaign’s announcement on Friday morning that it had raised $34.8 million online in the hours after a jury found Mr. Trump guilty on all 34 felony charges was a reminder of how thoroughly he has persuaded Republican voters that his own legal threats are a proxy for attacks on them.
On online forums that have previously been linked to mass shootings, people are threatening violence and attempting to publicly identify the 12 New York jurors who on Thursday decided to convict former President Donald Trump.
The calls for retribution began immediately after the verdict was announced.
“Hope these jurors face some street justice,” one anonymous user on a pro-Trump forum wrote. Another suggestively asked, “Wouldn’t [it] be interesting if just one person from Trump’s legal team anonymously leaked the names of the jurors?”
Anonymity is supposed to add a layer of protection for jurors doing their civic duty. Once reserved only for cases involving violent criminal enterprises, the practice is becoming more common. The judge in the Trump New York trial issued an order in March agreeing with prosecutors that most information about the jurors would be sealed. Trump’s lawyers did not disagree, according to the order.
Overnight, however, anonymous internet users on sites that are known havens of hate and harassment began sharing names, home addresses and other personal information belonging to people they say might have been members of the jury, a practice known as doxxing.
