Welcome to Tucker Carlson’s America
On March 19, amid reports that multiple US Senators had sold stocks after a closed-door briefing regarding the potential economic impacts of the Coronavirus — thus betraying a level of alarm at the crisis that they hid from their constituents — Tucker Carlson went on air to deliver a scathing monologue. In essentially the same breath, Tucker called on Senator Richard Burr, the scandal’s primary antagonist, to resign, and wantonly referred to the pandemic as the “Chinese Coronavirus”. It was a seamless confluence of left-wing populism and right-wing nationalism. It also might just represent the future of the Republican party. And if it does, Democrats should be nervous.
Carlson, once Jon Stewart’s bow-tie wearing punching bag, is now Fox’s most popular host, a frequent confidante of the President, and, in many ways, the intellectual inspiration of a large swathe of the conservative movement. This particular movement is as of now unnamed (calling it Trumpian gives far too much credit to a vacuous man), but has some firm ideals and a legitimate following. It is perhaps best understood as the “blood and soil” wing of the Republican party, but this doesn’t paint the full picture. While it is certainly nationalist, it is also far more progressive economically than the rest of its party. It is the growing American equivalent to the Front National in France: An anti-globalist, even nativist, wing, that also supports a large welfare state and other left-wing economic policies and at times provides pointed criticisms of the free-market economic policies that have been the soul of conservative ideology for generations. They are economically left, and culturally right. This combination has made it an existential threat to both the corporate wing of the Republican party, and, as it currently stands, the comparatively ideologically flimsy Democratic party.
In 2016, it was this precise sentiment that Donald Trump tapped into. He vowed that no American would be left without healthcare and railed against trade deals he said had unfairly burdened the American worker. The corporate wing of the Republican party was aghast; Jeb Bush attacked him for being pro-single payer health care. Trump promised that he, unlike his competitors, would never cut Medicare or Social Security. Trump simultaneously glorified nationalism, used coarse language to describe immigrants, and promised tighter restrictions on immigration, just four years after the RNC’s own post-election autopsy had said that the party’s treatment of and rhetoric about immigrants needed to improve. Again, establishment Republicans were left howling to the wind that “this wasn’t them.” Again, they were proven wrong. Never mind that the vast majority of Trump’s promises as a candidate have yet to manifest themselves as policy; the, admittedly confused, ideology he was promoting received enormous traction and eventually won him the Presidency.
The outbreak of the coronavirus has made the appeal of such an ideology even more apparent. The American right has already been sure to place blame for the outbreak on China, and Trump has emphasized the importance of the United States closing down its borders as a way to counteract the pandemic. At the same time, the economic costs of the outbreak have led to increased calls for typically left-wing economic proposals that would inject money into the hands of working class Americans. This dynamic comes atop the already growing calls from both sides of the aisle for the United States to do more to support its most economically vulnerable citizens. Poll after poll shows that the average American is far more left-wing economically than the political establishment on both the right and the left are.
Trump himself recently put his finger on precisely why the ideology seems logically consistent. Speaking about his response to COVID-19, the President said “This experience shows how important borders are. Without borders, you don’t have a nation, Our goal for the future must be to have American medicine for American patients, American supplies for American hospitals, and American equipment for our great American heroes.” By restricting immigration, and finding other measures to define who qualifies as American, a nationalist party by definition can more easily and freely aim welfarist policies to a set category of people than would a more open, more humane, liberal alternative. And therein lies the true political advantage of such a party. It manages to promise left-wing principles to our country’s most vulnerable, while maintaining the “us vs. them” and a (twisted) meritocratic framework that sees greater merit in Americans than in others, that appeals to so many conservatives.
This recipe has already managed to challenge, and in some ways supplant, the corporatist wing of the Republican Party. A party that once prided itself on free trade, a hawkish foreign policy, and support for big business now contains a strong strand of protectionist, isolationist, and ostensibly pro-worker members. It is difficult to imagine a more stark contrast between two same party nominees in consecutive elections than that between Mitt Romney — the socially moderate, fiscally conservative former Governor of Massachusetts and CEO of the investment firm Bain Capital — and the nominally populist Trump. His ascendancy to the Presidency has been accompanied by the emergence of other populist voices in Congress, notably Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri, who has drawn praise from the populist left for his advocacy of breaking up powerful corporations and Big Tech. The corporatist wing of the party still has a voice in the party, as evidenced by the 2016 tax cuts, but the new populist wing has launched a sustained assault on some of the GOP’s most cherished policy positions. Though as of now the assault is far more rhetorical than political, it is rhetoric that wins elections, and it is the rhetoric that should concern the Democrats.
One might counter that the Democratic party has its own populist wing. With presidential candidate Senator Bernie Sanders at the helm of the movement, the Democratic party has shifted steadily — and at times even dramatically — to the left over the last four years. Still, there is a strong reluctance towards, and even pushback against, allowing Sanders and his movement full control over the party and its platform. Whereas the Republican establishment, both politically and in the media, embraced Trump as his popularity became evident, the same has yet to occur in the Democratic establishment. One has only to turn on MSNBC to watch hosts chastise Sanders for not being a true “Democrat” and his followers for being too ideologically rigid. In the Republican party, for better or for worse, the establishment right now seems captive to its more rabidly populist electorate; in the Democratic party, for now, it is the electorate that seems captive to the whims of its establishment (see Biden, Joe). The corporatist wing of the Democratic party has thus far survived by packaging milquetoast economic reform and presenting it as dramatic change. While some voters may be won over by empty slogans and promises of cultural reforms (voters highly represented on Twitter and in MSNBC viewership), in general this recipe appeals to no real electorate. In truth, the policies enacted by the moderate Democrats probably have more in common with corporate Republicans than with the progressive left.
This is why the new “Tucker” right is so appealing, and, for the left, dangerous. Those invested primarily in economic reform will eventually find a home among right-wing populists, now more in tune with the average (white) American worker than the Democratic establishment. Some bona-fide leftists, such as Glenn Greenwald, already seem to be making that bargain. For those concerned with economic inequality and fed up with the political establishment, and yet unwilling to sacrifice immigrants, minorities and women in the process, there should be a concerted demand that the Democratic party move further left economically and listen to the demands of its younger electorate. For if Republicans manage to position themselves as the party of the American worker and the downtrodden, the Democratic party will soon find itself in the same position as corporatist, wall-street Republicans: wondering how they managed to lose their party to Mr. Carlson.
Written with Miles Malley
