A seismic shift from red to blue across the entire country — over 40 House seats, up to nine Senate seats, six governorships, every statewide office in multiple red states (e.g. Georgia, Texas), 12 legislative chambers (six with total Democratic control) and innumerable progressive referenda wins — wipes out a generation of MAGA Republicans and, potentially, their two guiding ideological doctrines: the United States is a white Christian country and election results that challenge white supremacy are illegitimate.
Just as a new political reality emerged behind the Iron Curtain when the Berlin Wall came down, perhaps the 2026 midterms will knock down the MAGA wall of fascism and give way to a radically different sort of American politics. So accustomed to dysfunction and pure insanity in the Trump era, we have found it nearly impossible until now to envision that its two mainstays, namely white Christian nationalism and election denial/voter suppression (e.g., concoct noncitizen voting conspiracies, refuse certification, seize ballots), could be headed for extinction.
Though these threats to pluralistic democracy are not yet dead, MAGA’s principal nostrums have been severely undermined — but not because of a new Supreme Court or spasm of Republican conscience. The MAGA era’s dual fixations are endangered because they resulted in the near ruin of the MAGA Republican Party.
How close are the ideological underpinnings to eradication, and how can Democrats finish them off?
White Christian nationalism implodes
The Texas Monthly magazine recounted (as we previously observed) that progressives of faith successfully challenged candidates espousing the anti-American notion that “America was founded as a Christian nation and should have laws that reflect a hard-line conservative version of the faith.” Instead, they repudiated appeal to bigotry “by electing members of religious minority groups that would be directly affected by the movement’s sustained success.” (For example, Muslim Abdul El-Sayed defeated Rep. Mike Rogers’s Islamophobia campaign; Jewish Democrat Jon Rosenthal beat hate-monger Bo French for the Texas Railroad Commission; and progressive pastors, Democrats James Talarico and Adam Hamilton, won Senate seats in Texas and Kansas.) Anthea Butler, chair of University of Pennsylvania’s religious studies department, predicted that with so many electoral defeats at the hands of progressive candidates of faith, white Christian nationalism “is going to become much more muted.”
Despite reason for optimism, we likely are not on the cusp of the demise of “a certain type of culture-war politics.” However, more Democrats may be inclined to stand up to white Christian nationalist bullies, and some Republicans may grasp that quashing religious pluralism comes at a political cost. After MAGA’s message of Islamophobia and transphobia tied up with the threat of eternal damnation for voting for Democrats failed so miserably, we can expect to see less of this anti-American hate.
On the immigration front, Republicans’ decades-long descent into white-nationalist scaremongering, demonization of migrants, great replacement theory hooey, and out-and-out lies about noncitizen voting came crashing down in an election wipeout. The massive exodus of Hispanics from the Republican Party, including many who just two years earlier had been ready to give Trump a shot, may have been the single biggest factor in Republicans’ most grievous political injury: its obliteration in Texas. Trump and white supremacist chief of staff Stephen Miller may want to double down on the Republicans’ self-immolation, but others in the party are queasy about that political death wish.
How do Democrats promote the death of white supremacy and institutionalized xenophobia? Keep faith with Hispanic voters (on economics and ICE defunding, specifically), refuse to tolerate bullying of marginal groups in the name of religion, end religious bigotry’s institutionalization at the Pentagon, and pursue common sense immigration reform. Only in forcing Republicans to defend unpopular stances (and bear the political price) or to abandon white Christian nationalism can Democrats beat back the scourge of intolerance.
Election-Denial Wipeout
Donald Trump’s election-denial fetish and the shocking assault on voting spectacularly failed on multiple fronts. Serial legal pratfalls rejected even by the MAGA Supreme Court majority wound up confirming the paucity of illegal voting. Galling Justice Department suppression tactics and gerrymandering designed to rob minorities of voting power backfired throughout red states and supercharged the Democratic electorate.
As G. Elliott Morris explained, Black turnout “surged only in the Deep South, where the fight over Black representation was most immediate, and where Republican lawmakers had moved most aggressively to weaken it.” He continued: “Republicans may have had the power to redraw the maps, but Black voters still had the power to hold them accountable. In 2026, they turned out in extraordinary numbers, overcoming some of the barriers Republicans had erected to weaken their political influence. Republicans should learn a lesson from this: There is an electoral cost to vote-rigging.” (Other studies confirm that the Callais counterattack fueled huge Democratic gains in the South.)
Democrats can drive a stake through election denial and voter suppression if they refuse to schedule confirmation hearings for any nominee who denies Joe Biden won the 2020 election, keep voting rights and Supreme Court reform front and center, pass legislation to harshly punish election threats and interference, and embrace the National Popular Vote Compact (to take the electoral college out of the picture, spelling the end of phony elector stunts).
And what about the cult?
A major factor regarding the trajectory and speed of MAGA’s crack up is whether the Republican Party musters an effort to overthrow the cult of personality and end the reign of the mad king. Even before Miller was named chief of staff, the Trump cult was already under assault with Republican politicians openly blaming, ridiculing, and breaking with him (even his own vice president on the war!). The White House is nervously eyeing a full-scale rebellion in conservative circles. (It is noteworthy that Republicans have ignored Trump’s directive to install Republican Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan.)
Ironically, the appointment of the archvillain architect of Republicans’ war on immigrants as chief of staff — someone so easily vilified and identified with their self-destruction — may actually accelerate the White House crackup, pushing the White House into ever more untenable extremism that helps unify Democrats. (Initial reaction to his appointment from elected Democrats suggests Miller strengthened their conviction that attempts to compromise with Trump would be pure folly.)
How do Democrats promote the flight from the mad king? A bipartisan impeachment vote on Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth would signal that Trump’s power is seeping away. Democrats can also create disincentives to do his bidding (e.g., subpoenas and warnings of liability for corrupt private-sector players; impeachment, disbarment and court sanctions for DOJ lawyers; state prosecution and civil liability for officials’ misconduct).
In short, forcing Republican lawmakers and regime underlings to confront the implications of Trump’s insanity may promote defections and hasten his crackup. Meanwhile, forcing Trump to veto popular measures (e.g. reinstate Medicaid funding, end tariffs) may aggravate tensions within a party trying to decide how it can extricate itself from its cult leader.
Going forward
Whether Trump’s installing the poster boy for fascism as chief of staff hastens the Republican stampede away from him or instead prolongs MAGA’s political death spiral remains an open question. We do know, however, that the election did considerable damage to MAGA’s core political assumptions. It turns out that voters reject the notion that the United States is the province of one religion or race, and they actually jealously guard voting rights. If Democrats double down on commitments to the rule of law and pluralistic democracy and refuse to buy into the fallacy that they can do business with Trump and his white supremacist sidekick, they can accelerate the demise of our national nightmare.
Great essay. I was just on my first ever trip to Berlin, and was impressed with the sites that have been left intact as reminders. We don’t have a physical structure to remind us of our brush with fascism, but we must remember, it ain’t over.
Every Democrat should read this column. Hell, everyone in the country should read this column. Jennifer Rubin continues to be the most thoughtful, insightful and articulate political commentator in the country. (Heart emoji!)