by Guest contributor John Reimann writes on the potential stakes of this year’s midterm elections and how socialists could take the lead in fighting Trump and his fascistic entourage. Signed articles and guest contributions do not necessarily represent the collective viewpoint of Reform & Revolution.
On January 6, 2020, Donald Trump shocked the world by trying to carry out a violent coup. It failed because it was poorly planned and lacked sufficient support within his administration. His military tops and even his Attorney General, Bill Barr, who had resigned just a few days before, did not support that attempted coup. However, it created a fascistic tradition that lives to this day, and now Trump is taking steps to build on that tradition. Here is what has happened.
According to the New York Times, during the Biden administration 69 election deniers took office on various state and local election boards. “They include county election directors, members of election boards, and members of various county governing boards with the power to canvass and certify the vote.” These are not just people who lie. “Among those officials, 41 have taken direct action to interfere with elections, such as trying to delay or deny certification, or have direct ties to activist election-denier groups. Roughly 60 people posted or shared messages on social media —some repeatedly and others just once — questioning the election results in 2020 or supporting other conspiracy theories.” The Times also writes that an additional 25 election deniers have taken office since Trump was re-elected.
Immediately upon his return to power, Trump pardoned all those who participated in the January 6 coup attempt. In addition to freeing 1600 violent fascists, Trump’s pardon further legitimized what was already becoming a tradition of trying to steal elections. Trump also learned from his first term. In that term, he appointed Jim Mattis as Secretary of Defense, followed by Mark Esper. As Attorney General he first had Jeff Sessions and then Bill Barr. As right-wing as these figures may have been, they were more loyal to the Constitution and the traditional means of capitalist rule through capitalist democracy than they were to Trump personally. Mark Milley, for example, made that clear in his speech when he said that “We don’t take an oath to an individual. We take an oath to the Constitution, and we take an oath to the idea that is America, and we’re willing to die to protect it.” And Mark Esper wrote an entire memoir titled “A Sacred Oath” along those lines.
Trump’s present cabinet includes Pete Hegseth and Todd Blanche. Hegseth is a committed Christian white nationalist and both are purely Trump flunkies. As opposed to the previous cabinet members, Trump’s entire present cabinet not only accepts but advances all his steps that violate “normal” Constitutional means of rule. Consider, for example, Trump’s steps to limit mail-in voting. Trump intuitively understands that mail-in voting is harder to control because it’s easier to limit who actually shows up to vote in person. That’s why he has campaigned against mail-in voting for years. This year, he took an important step against mail-in voting
by issuing Executive Order 14399. Under that order, statewide mail-in ballots would only be sent out by the United States Postal Service (USPS) if those states provide the postal service with a list of legally registered voters. Each ballot envelope would have its own unique bar code which USPS would scan. The postal service would check a sample number and if the name on even a single envelope didn’t match their list, the entire batch of thousands of mail-in ballots would be returned to their state of origin. If a voter had changed their name due to divorce, for example, that could cause a rejection.
Appeals court judge Indira Talwani ruled the whole scheme unconstitutional and issued a restraining order against the postal service. Trump’s DOJ appealed to the Supreme Court. While the appeal was being considered, the restraining order was in effect, but Trump’s postal service secretly violated the restraining order according to U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal. The Trump
Supreme Court (in)justices (The “Trump Six” – Roberts, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Barrett, Alito and Thomas) threw out the restraining order, but then Talwani issued a new one which even three Trump (in)justices upheld. They upheld it because almost all election officials, including Republicans, said it was too late to implement Trump’s executive order at this time. The fact that Trump’s postal service got away with violating the first restraining order leaves the administration free to follow that pattern. The Supreme Court has since partially approved Trump’s plans, deciding 6-3 to permit the Department of Homeland Security to create the federal citizenship list, share it with states, and enable the Attorney General to prioritize prosecution of election officers who provide ballots to “ineligible” voters. The Supreme Court also greenlit USPS rulemaking for the design of state ballots. The withholding of ballots is still blocked due to a separate legal case.
The huge expansion of ICE also has to be seen in this context. Its budget is now over $200 billion, according to the Brennan Center. “ICE is expanding at breakneck speed” writes Wired. They say that ICE has leased 150 new offices throughout the country. Trump’s DHS secretary Markwayne Mullin has said that ICE agents will be deployed at polling stations on Election Day.
Another threat to the election process is potentially posed by current Speaker of the House Mike Johnson. Once elections are held, the House formally ceases to exist until the House clerk recognizes the election results and calls the elected representatives into office. The new ones then elect the next House Speaker. Until now, the role of the House clerk has been performed in a technical, nonpartisan way. A July 27, 2026, New York Times article explained how that whole process could be subverted by an election denier House clerk whom Johnson could appoint. Neither Trump nor anybody else knows exactly what will happen on Election Day or after regarding his plans to steal the election. How far he can go and whether he succeeds or not is uncertain. However, it is inconceivable that he won’t create massive confusion and even chaos to some extent or another. Who will benefit from this?
Most socialists are insufficiently aware of the extent that the Nazi-friendly Tucker Carlson and his minions have gained support. They are now bitterly opposed to Trump, as exemplified by Carlson’s recent interview with NPR. Their opposition is based on the belief that “the Jews” manipulate US and world politics at the expense of white Christians.1 For example, in his interview with Jiang Xueqin, an online commentator widely accused of promoting conspiracy theories, Carlson said “Of course, the white populations are killed on purpose. And the question is, why? And I don’t have the faintest idea, and there’s a lot of speculation as to who’s doing it. I’ll just say bluntly: I don’t mean I know who the instruments are, of course. But Keir Starmer is not in charge of Great Britain. Macron is not in charge of France. I’m not sure how many leaders really do have control of their countries. I don’t know how many countries actually have sovereignty. I really don’t know the answer.”
This is a clear invocation of the “white genocide” conspiracy theory and a suggestion that there is a sinister, globalist “Other” behind world events. Carlson continues, “Something is going on…. There’s no such thing as multiculturalism. There’s always a dominant culture that, you know, that insists on dominance. Of course, I just don’t think there’s ever been anyone who thought this could happen globally, like a systematic targeting of a race for elimination globally. Well, it wasn’t possible until pretty recently, but it would be interesting to know what the plan is. There’s clearly, like, a plan behind that. There’s a plan behind everything. I wonder, how many Americans do you think understand what’s actually happening in the world right now?”
That is why Carlson opposes Israel. He is implying the old Nazi-friendly anti-Semitic trope that the Western world is dominated by a “Zionist-Occupied Government” with a plan to exterminate whites and eliminate Christianity. For example, he stresses Israel’s attacks on Christians both in Jerusalem and in Baghdad. Carlson is the most popular component of a right-wing populist media ecosystem which includes open fascists like Nick Fuentes. Carlson and his ilk will likely campaign against Trump’s attempts to overturn the elections. They will claim that Israel is behind those attempts. Millions will understand what Carlson means, no matter how he denies it when speaking to the mainstream press – it’s “the Jews”. The fact that Netanyahu will support Trump’s attempts will give superficial credibility to that claim. One danger is that some on the left may join in with Carlson. How should socialists deal with the issue?
On the one hand, the claim that Israel, ”the Jews,” is behind any attempts by Trump to steal the election is simply false. Trump’s attacks on democratic rights and the electoral system are generated by the dynamics of homegrown reaction, including fascism, in the United States itself. This fascistic movement doesn’t need an outside agency for it to develop. Any claims about Israel/”the Jews” being behind any attempts of Trump to steal the election distract from the real issues we face here at home and feed into Nazi-friendly anti-Semitism.
Rather than joining in the Nazi-friendly pro-Putin voices like Tucker Carlson, socialists should be out in front warning of the extreme danger that Trump’s election theft plans pose. We should be explaining that his plans amount to denial of the very right to vote itself. This is a throwback to the days of the Jim Crow South. At that time, the denial of the right to vote by black people went hand-in-hand with lynching and other forms of violent repression. Racist terror also went hand in hand with forcible suppression of attempts to organize unions in the South, including lynching of union organizers. Today, Trump is planning to institute a similar regime on a national basis. In place of the KKK and informal lynch mobs, Trump has ICE, whose agents murder civilians in the streets. When necessary, fascistic street gangs such as the Proud Boys will crawl out of the woodwork.
The further Trump goes in his attacks, the greater the resistance will tend to arise. That resistance may go well beyond the legalistic “No Kings” type one-day marches. One possibility is that a movement could develop similar to the French “Yellow Vest” movement of 2018. That was a spontaneous movement against austerity that nearly shut down the country through road blockades and other forms of direct action, including shutting down workplaces. The movement was composed of all sorts of different political tendencies from the far right to the far left. If working class-oriented socialists2 are not at the front of the fight against Trump, the danger is that the far right – Carlson and company – will be the main beneficiaries. If they gain ascendancy, they will then turn to more openly divide the working class and repress all those who oppose them, especially socialists.
It is impossible to predict with certainty what will happen during and after the midterm elections, up to and including the election results being overturned. It’s possible that Trump’s support might collapse so drastically that he’s unable to mount a serious threat to overturn the elections. It would be extremely unwise to count on that, however, and in any case he will be stirring up confusion and increased anger against his opponents. Even if he is unable to mount a serious threat to overturn the elections, in the very best of cases we will be entering a situation that is even more dangerous than what we have seen in Trump’s first two years. Even if the Republicans are swamped in the midterms, Trump still retains about one-third of the electorate’s support. These are the die-hards who believe anything Trump says. If he says the Democrats “cheated again” in the midterms, they will believe it and will be even more angry and inclined to violence. The Trump administration itself will support them, even if it is only from behind the scenes.
That is why DSA should be raising a hue and cry about this danger immediately. DSA is the only socialist group with any real influence on events in the United States. DSA chapters or even one or more of its caucuses can start by calling public meetings to discuss this danger. Out of this, DSA members, chapters, or any of its caucuses can start to organize Committees of Resistance which center around working-class schools and communities, and fight for other chapters and the national organization to take up this work.
A crucial aspect should be building such committees in workplaces. That also means organizing within unions. The goal of these committees should be to build towards or actually initiate workplace shutdowns. Every wing of the union leadership, including their hired staffers, will oppose this strategy. That leaves no alternative but to build rank-and-file union caucuses opposed to the union leadership. Right now, there is very little mood among union members to organize against a union leadership in which the great majority of members have little trust. If a mass working class movement starts to develop, that ferment will find its way into the unions and then the mood will change among the rank-and-file.
At present, working class-oriented socialists may find that there is not a great deal of response to our ideas and proposed course of action. Working class people in our neighborhoods and coworkers in our workplaces and unions may listen and think about what we have to say about the Trump danger and more, but may not be ready to act. That’s a difficulty we have to sit with for now. We will have raised the issue and helped alert workers to this serious threat. If and when a crisis hits, those same workers will tend to turn to us in order to organize. This is the general strategy that DSA should adopt. How individuals can implement it will depend on their specific situation. For a start, at least some of the caucuses in DSA can start down that road by calling their own open meetings to discuss this dangerous situation which also offers some unprecedented opportunities for working class-oriented socialists.
- Carlson publicly denies that he is an antisemite. To see why that is a lie and that Carlson’s politics are structurally antisemitic, see my article “The Many Faces of Tucker Carlson.” ↩︎
- The reason I specify “working class-oriented socialists” is that our starting point has to be to keep in mind the mood and the consciousness of the working class or at least a significant sector of the working class. ↩︎
John Reimann
John Reimann is a retired carpenter, the former recording secretary of Carpenters Local 713 and an expelled member of that union. He was expelled for his fighting for the membership, including in the great SF Bay Area carpenters wildcat strike of 1999. He has been a member of East Bay DSA for ten years and is editor of the Oakland Socialist website.
