Will the GOP Embrace White Supremacy & Fascism, or Go Back to Being the Party of the Rich?

The Democratic Party hit its crossroads moment in 2021 when President Biden embraced a progressive vision for America, breaking with Clinton’s and Obama’s neoliberal centrism.

Even if Senators Sinema and Manchin prevented him from putting them into effect, Biden’s hearty support for Bernie Sanders’ $3 trillion Build Back Better plan and John Sarbanes’ For The People legislation that ends gerrymandering and big money in politics showed his newfound commitment and progressive credentials.

The GOP is hitting their crossroads moment with the election this year and their preparations for the 2024 presidential election. Will they continue to embrace white supremacy, misogyny, and fascism, or go back to just being the party of the rich?

The fate and future of American democracy may hang on the decision they make.

Prior to the late 1960s, the Republican Party under Presidents Harding, Coolidge, Hoover and Eisenhower had been the party of big business and the rich. It was southern Democrats back then who mostly carried the banner of the Confederacy, of racial and sectarian hatred, of paranoid conspiracy.

But in 1954 the Supreme Court overturned its own 1896 Plessy v Ferguson “separate but equal” decision and ruled that racially segregated schools were unconstitutional and, thus, illegal. Out of that ruling came an explosion of rightwing white supremacist groups…