After months of transphobic attack ads that failed to move the needle for Republicans ahead of next week’s midterms, the GOP has now pivoted to harshly Islamophobic attacks to try to turn out its disillusioned MAGA base. And it’s getting nasty.
The bulk of the attacks have been trained on Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Michigan. They range from unfounded accusations of a connection to the Muslim Brotherhood to Trump outright accusing him of being “a jihadist” who would need to “go through the metal detector” to enter the Senate. Even Governor Greg Abbott of Texas is now accusing his Democratic opponent Gina Hinojosa of “supporting Sharia Law.”
In tomorrow’s piece, dives into the GOP’s 11th hour escalation of anti-Muslim attacks. He explores how it’s a fitting final act for Trumpism, the logical, grotesque extension of the birtherism attacks against Obama that first put Trump on the political map.
And in case you missed it, yesterday wrote about recent pro-democracy electoral victories in Serbia and Brazil, which follow months after Hungary ousted its own authoritarian strong man. With Benjamin Netanyahu denied an outright majority in Israel yesterday and with Trump’s party on the chopping block here in the U.S. next week, can a global pro-democracy movement overcome the rising tide of right-wing nationalism?
