MAGA can’t stop the ugly infighting
It’s been five years since the presidential election of 2016, and for all intents and purposes, Donald Trump’s ‘Make America Great Again’ movement, or MAGA, seemed unstoppable. His bombastic, take-no-prisoners campaign style and promised fixes for some of the nation’s most vexing problems electrified his supporters, who in turn fueled a political earthquake that swept him to the White House.
But MAGA’s electoral victory, thrilling as it was, masked the existence of deeply divisive tendencies that had long defined Trump’s core following. That division, masked beneath a layer of superficial solidarity during the 2016 election cycle, erupted into a crescendo of nasty, backroom sniping the moment Trump claimed the presidency.
What had seemed, to those who supported MAGA, as a united movement turned out to be little more than a bunch of squabbling, hard-nosed factionalists using the ‘brand’ as cover for their personal feuds, professional rivalries, and narrow self-interest.
Five years into Trump’s reign, MAGA remains an effective symbol of white identity politics and right-wing anger. But those same attributes which had driven his movement’s grassroots enthusiasm in the first place—passion, resentment, distrust of ‘other’—also now contribute to a culture of ugliness that cannot be bridged by bromides or talking points alone.