In the latest episode of America’s political soap opera, President Donald Trump made a dramatic break with former ally and notorious MAGA hat-wearer Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.
President Trump posted on his platform Truth Social on Friday, slamming his fellow Republicans as “weird” and “far left,” claiming he didn’t have time to deal with her alleged barrage of calls and claiming he “can’t take a call from a lunatic who spews abuse every day.”
As the New York Times noted, President Trump previously “stood by” when Greene was criticized for “pushing conspiracy theories about the Sept. 11 attacks, school shootings, and wildfires caused by space lasers.”
There’s nothing “crazy” about it anyway.
Ms. Greene denied calling the president and instead said she sent an email suggesting that he stop efforts to block the release of the so-called Epstein file on the late pedophile and disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, who may have ties to Mr. Trump.
The U.S. House of Representatives is scheduled to vote on the issue this week, but Greene is not the only Republican divided within her party. Other House Republicans, including Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Lauren Boebert of Colorado, have also spoken out against Trump over the Epstein issue.
In a typical change of attitude, Trump has now spontaneously reversed his position on the Epstein file, posting on Truth Social late Sunday: “House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein file because there’s nothing to hide.”
Still, the Epstein files aren’t the only issue that raises questions about whether MAGA is heading toward some kind of self-combustion.
As President Trump recently reminded the American people, “Remember, MAGA was my idea. MAGA was nobody else’s idea.”
So it’s no surprise that people associate the apparent failure of “Make America Great Again” with the ideas man himself.
There are limits to the effectiveness of overt propaganda, and people tend to notice when there isn’t enough money to put food on the table, despite the president’s upbeat statements about the state of the economy.
Even President Trump seems to be aware, to some extent, that by advocating pointless tariffs and other punitive fiscal measures, he stands to further alienate his base. As a non-solution, the government is lowering tariffs on coffee and bananas, while the president is mulling the possibility of $2,000 duty rebate checks and 50-year mortgages.
A Nov. 14 White House news release blamed Democrats for the country’s “economic turmoil,” but assured the public that the prices of “everyday necessities” like ice cream were “falling” and that “grocery prices and housing prices are trending in the right direction.”
The news release ends with the inspiring words, “We continue to make progress and the best is yet to come.”
In addition to the cost of living crisis, another source of growing discontent among Republicans is U.S. support for Israel. In July, Greene became the first Republican to specifically condemn the genocide in the Gaza Strip and denounce the “starvation” of Palestinians.
To be sure, U.S. support for Israel is not just a Republican thing. President Trump’s Democratic predecessor, Joe Biden, was willing to spend tens of billions of dollars on a genocidal state starving and otherwise wiping out civilians in Gaza.
But the Trump administration put a twist on business as usual by not only supporting Israel outright, but simultaneously threatening to starve poor Americans at home by withholding essential food aid.
But at least the price of ice cream is “falling”.
Two days before officially breaking with Greene, Trump appeared on Truth Social last week and warned that “only very bad or stupid Republicans would fall into” the Democratic “trap” of the “Jeffrey Epstein hoax,” which he said was concocted solely to divert attention from Democrats’ widespread violations.
But as President Trump reveals that he is perhaps not the best person to “drain the swamp in Washington, D.C.,” one of the president’s long-standing promises to root out corruption and other traditional political vices, it appears that a growing number of MAGA supporters may be in danger of falling into evil and folly.
Indeed, President Trump’s seizures over the potential release of details about Epstein, a man deeply mired in the aforementioned “swamp,” do not bode well for the prospects of drainage.
Again, the fact that Americans reelected a nepotistic billionaire and convicted criminal as head of state suggests that this quagmire probably isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
On a micro level, the melodrama within MAGA may provide the audience with a fleeting sense of satisfaction. However, this drama will not serve as a stepping stone toward a substantive improvement in the political situation.
And while opposing Trump is objectively a noble cause, we don’t need more people thinking space lasers caused wildfires or likening pandemic safety measures to the Holocaust. What’s more, we don’t need any more genocidal-enabling Democrats who are, after all, as hell-bent on maintaining a corrupt plutocracy as the Republicans are.
Blind and unquestioning support for the president may be eroding among his MAGA base. But don’t worry, the swamp is here to stay.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial policy.
