Violence is becoming the new normal of Trump's America

Political violence has existed as long as politics. From both the left and the right, violence against political enemies has been a feature, not a bug, of radical political movements. Vladimir Lenin developed a "science of terror", in which violence was essential to overthrow the state. In Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler declared: "The very first essential for success is a perpetually constant and regular employment of violence." And Benito Mussolini declared political violence a necessary tool both in his early days as a socialist and after his conversion to fascism. Radicals demonise their enemies and insist on responding with violence justified by any means.

So there is nothing new about the political violence that is becoming increasingly normalised in American life. While much is aimed at Democrats, the Republicans are not immune. The 2024 campaign saw two assassination attempts on Trump, and, in 2017, Steve Scalise, now the Republican Majority Leader of the House, was shot at a softball game.

The social media echo chamber, amplified by easy access to weapons, draws a variety of misfits, conspiracists and millenarian nuts out of the woodwork. But by any objective measure, political violence is primarily counter-revolutionary violence, and at the moment that is most obviously of a type egged on by MAGA rhetoric and the dehumanising and mocking of victims.

In Minnesota, a pro-Trump, anti-abortion gunman posing as a police officer murdered the former Speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives, Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, in cold blood and put 17 bullets into Democratic State Senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, who miraculously survived. This, in a state known for "Minnesota Nice".

The MAGA-sphere went into immediate overdrive to blame it on "the libs". Senator Mike Lee of Utah posted photos of the gunman with the caption, "This is what happens when Marxists don't get their way." In one brief sentence, Lee tells the lie that the killer was somehow a MAGA political enemy rather than a Trump supporter, and that the problem with violence is Marxists and Marxism.

The United States has many issues but adherence to or even knowledge of the principles of Karl Marx is not one of them. A second post by Lee says "Nightmare on Waltz [sic] street," a bizarre attempt at humour suggesting Minnesota Governor Tim Walz was to blame for the shootings.

So, with two people dead and two gravely injured, children left without parents and a quiet, progressive community terrorised, the response from the right is that it is the liberals' fault. There is no need for apology or even empathy: it is not a serious matter. Trump initially said there was no place for political violence, but then took the time to say he would not call Governor Walz to discuss the terrible violence because Walz was "a mess," grossly incompetent, and a "terrible governor." There is no shared empathy in tragedy for Trump. Political enmity is the cardinal value.

Yet two weeks ago, Democratic Senator Alex Padilla was manhandled and thrown to the ground by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem's security goons for daring to try to speak out at a press conference in California. They knew that he was a US Senator, and he repeated it multiple times. In the face of video evidence, the Trump Administration simply lied. Trump was reported as saying that Padilla, the son of Mexican immigrants who worked menial jobs to send him to MIT, "looked like an illegal."

Just two of Padilla's 53 Republican colleagues in the Senate spoke out; the rest were silent. Additionally, in May, Mayor of Newark Ras Baraka was arrested and Congresswoman LaMonica McIver was charged with felony assault and obstructing ICE. Last week, the New York City Comptroller, Brad Lander, was roughed up and arrested by ICE for demanding to see a warrant. All are Democrats, and three are people of colour.

When then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi's home was invaded in 2022 in an attempt to kill her (she wasn't home), her octogenarian husband, Paul, had his skull fractured with a hammer. First, the MAGA-sphere lit up with the baseless rumour that this was a gay encounter gone wrong, and then they treated it as a joke.

Trump went full stand-up comic: "We'll stand up to crazy Nancy Pelosi, who ruined San Francisco — how's her husband doing, anybody know?" But he had more: "And she's against building a wall at our border, even though she has a wall around her house, which obviously didn't do a very good job."

And of course, during the insurrection of January 6 2021, when thousands of people were looking to hang Trump's former vice president, Mike Pence, and invaded Nancy Pelosi's office, this too was par for the course. For hours, Trump did nothing to stand them down and was accused of suggesting that Pence indeed deserved to be hanged. When back in power, he indiscriminately gave a blanket pardon to more than 1,000 of those who invaded the capital, including those involved in violence and injury to more than 1,000 police officers, and multiple deaths. These were, in Trump's view, the real patriots.

Political violence against enemies has been coupled with comic relief to convince people that they don't really need to worry about these victims or what is going on in the streets or federal buildings of America.