Far-righters Held Congress Hostage Twice but America Has a Radical-left Problem?
How ironic that it happened twice on January 6?
If there is one lesson that we should take away from the Speaker of the House fiasco it is that the far right and white supremacists indeed possess institutional power in the Republican Party.
The Freedom Caucus, a far right congressional caucus made up of members that compared BLM to the KKK and called the Supreme Court protecting gay marriage “a threat to democracy,” was able to hijack Congress from January 3 to January 6. Ironically, it was the second time the far right held Congress hostage on January 6.
The Freedom Caucus made up of white supremacists, homophobes, antisemites, and insurrectionists, paralyzed the House of Representatives until mainstream Republicans agreed to their demands. Mainstream Republicans not only caved into the demands of the Freedom Caucus but bent over backward for them. Demonstrating the influence the far right holds in our country.
Meanwhile, progressives in Congress couldn’t even get rail workers six days of sick lead or protect the Child Tax Credit which lifted 2.9 million children out of poverty. Congressional progressives that Fox News pushed as “the radical left” couldn’t even get the Democratic Party to not increase the military budget at a time when the United States does not have an active war going on.
My point is far right politicians like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Rep. Matt Gaetz have the power to shut down our government when ultra-conservative demands are met, meanwhile, what power do progressives really hold in our government?
There’s a narrative that our politics is in a cultural war between the far right and far left, but the legislation that gets passed proves that is obviously not the case. I would argue that the radical left does not even have a presence in our government at all.
As someone who self-identifies politically as far left, I challenge you to find me one politician in the federal government that is the Marxist-woke boogeyman that Fox News constantly warns America about. Rep. Ocasio-Cortez, who is normally Fox News’ villain of the radical left is supposed to be the counter to ultra-conservatism but her voting history marks her as basically identical to any other moderate Democrat.
So, one of two things must be true: either progressive Democrats don’t have the institutional power to force moderate Democrats to bend to their will in the way the far right Republicans can do with their party, or progressive Dems aren’t really that far left. I would argue both are true.
The narrative is that Marxism and communism from the far left are invading our government but the numbers just don’t back up that claim; coming from someone who wished there were more Marxists in our government. Out of the 535 members of Congress in 2023; only 7 self-identify as Democratic Socialist and none identify as Marxist or communist.
In comparison here is the far right’s influence in Congress:
169 Republicans voted against gay marriage in 2022. 170 members of Congress in 2023 will be either open election deniers or election doubters. 469 members of this Congress will self-identify as Christian. Being Christian does not necessarily mean being far right, but Christians are more likely to be a part of the far right than atheists and definitely aren’t the liberal woke-atheist boogeyman that Fox News claims are infiltrating our politics.
Most importantly only 72 members of the 2023 Congress swore off corporate money. Again showing that most of Congress is in the pockets of large corporations and not secret radical-left powers influencing the government.
But if you listen to Fox News or any other conservative and centrist media voices there seems to be an equal concern of far right and far left ideologies invading our governmental institutions. Obviously, that isn’t true but where are these far left woke boogeymen that so many Americans are scared of?
Yes, far left political views do exist but they are a small percentage of Americans that are mostly confined to academia, college campuses, and social media. Yes, there are academics on Twitter and teenagers on TikTok that need to go outside and interact with real people, but these people do not hold institutional power in deciding policy nor do they represent the political beliefs of most Democrats or liberal-identifying people.
More importantly, the far left social media activists do not make up the majority of the Democratic Party in the same way that actual white nationalists, election deniers, and Christian Evangelicals make up the core base of the Republican Party. Republicans attempt to argue that the far right beliefs are a fringe minority of their voters when in reality 30–70% of their base holds these far right beliefs.
The Southern Poverty Law Center reported in a study that upwards of 50% of Republicans believe in The Great Replacement Theory, a far-right conspiracy theory that immigrants and ethnic minorities are purposely replacing white people in America. 62% of Republicans believe that feminism does more harm than good. 75% of Republicans believe that Black Lives Matter is a threat to the country with Freedom Caucus member Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene publicly comparing BLM with the KKK.
Which is a greater threat to the functioning of the country — a fringe group of leftists online arguing for prison abolition or 70% of Republican voters believing the 2020 election is illegitimate?
Consequences of the far left may be speakers and celebrities not being platformed on some campuses and property damage in response to police murdering unarmed citizens. While the consequences of far right beliefs are conspiracy theories around vaccines that directly killed tens of thousands of Americans.
Not to mention Antifa never stormed our Capitol and threatened to kill elected officials. BLM is not responsible for the significant rise of hate crimes in this country. Arguing that the far right and the far left are just as bad and powerful in America is not just factually incorrect but that rhetoric is what allows fascism to spread unchecked.
Touching back on the cultural aspect there seems to be a talking point in American discourse that progressives control the media, but again, I ask you to name one progressive that owns any mainstream media platform. The vast majority of shareholders and executives are still middle-aged white men who normally vote and donate to Republicans.
Yes, media companies and corporations may performatively pander to “woke” ideas in an attempt to help their profits, but these companies are the same institutions that lobby Congress to not raise the minimum wage, not provide health care for gender-affirming care, and won’t mandate maternity leave for new mothers.
Also, these are the same companies funding campaigns to the same legislators that are taking away women's right to an abortion and pushing mass incarceration. These companies are not leftists forcing “wokism” on conservative Americans; these companies understand that they have to appeal to wealthy liberals, queer people, and minorities in order to maximize their bottom line.
For a final point, I want to make a reminder that while Republicans walk hand in hand with the far right, no one hates leftists more than other liberals. Liberals and moderate Democrats blame leftists for the rise of Trumpism and other far right beliefs.
How is the far left threatening to take over the country when they can’t even hold power with other Democrats?
Not to mention when surveyed, Democrats are pretty conservative as a group compared to the perceived notion that there is a far left and far right pull in this country.
In 2022 according to the Pew Research Center, 59% of Democrats actually support increasing funding for Border Patrol and almost 40% of Democrats believe that greater acceptance of transpeople is bad for our society. 34% of Democrats even view BLM as a national threat and most Democrats don’t support defunding the police.
These are all positions that I vehemently disagree with, but my point is to demonstrate that there is not a far left movement in the Democrat Party in the same way that there is a very real far right movement in the Republican Party. I also want to reaffirm that the people on the far-left being “mean about pronouns” is not the same level of threat as 50% of Republicans believing in a white supremacist conspiracy theory.
The far left obviously does not have a grasp on Democrats or we would be having a conversation on the national level about universal health care, free education, and viewing housing and transportation as a public service and not a luxury. We would be having conversational about guaranteed parental leave and a $ 22-an-hour minimum wage. We would have conversations around allowing gender expression to be as individualist as possible and destroying gender norms altogether.
However, the fact that we aren’t having these conversations is proof that the Overton window is shifted so far right that even criminal justice reform and a $15-an-hour minimum wage are viewed as radically left positions, while true white supremacists and election deniers are presented with the same level of danger as angry academics and teenagers online.
