Former President Donald Trump returned to Washington this week for what was billed as a “political speech” at the America First Policy Institute, a Trump-friendly advocacy group made up of several people who served in his administration. Unsurprisingly, the policies he’s touted are the same ones he backed when he was president and which Republicans are increasingly embracing in state legislatures across the country: punitive, high-handed and mean-spirited.
Cruelty to vulnerable Americans, like the homeless, is becoming the norm in Republican politics.
There were Trump’s usual calls to execute drug traffickers, bring back “stop and frisk policies to cities” and deploy the National Guard to high-crime urban areas. But one political idea was new: Trump called for removing thousands of homeless people from American cities and having them live in tents on “large, cheap plots of land on the outskirts of cities.”
It’s a political prescription more accurately described as “out of sight, out of mind.” And given that as president he had infant migrant children forcibly separated from their parents, this is disturbingly consistent.
But it’s not just Trump. Cruelty to vulnerable Americans, like the homeless, is becoming the norm in Republican politics. Last month, Missouri Governor Mike Parsons, a Republican, signed legislation that includes some of the punitive measures Trump has promoted this week. The bill Parsons signed, which has passed through the GOP-controlled state legislature, directly targets the homeless population by making it a crime to sleep on state-owned land, such as under overpasses. and bridges. Violators can be fined up to $750 or sentenced to up to 15 days in jail.
The law gives Missouri’s attorney general the power to prosecute cities that don’t enforce the ban and allows homelessness funds to be withdrawn from cities where homelessness rates exceed the city’s average. ‘State. The new law also prevents cities and nonprofit groups from using state grants or federal grants to build permanent housing. Local governments would instead be required to use the money to build the kind of temporary camps described by Trump — and those in those camps would first have to undergo mental health assessments and drug tests. dope. This is against federal policy, which prohibits such requirements.
The legislation, in effect, criminalizes homelessness and makes it more difficult for homeless people to find permanent accommodation. The law is so cumbersome that Valerie Huhn, director of the Missouri Department of Mental Health and a member of the governor’s cabinet, told Parsons the law would hurt the homeless population and advised him not to sign it because it would would make their problems worse. In vain.
Republicans have at least used the rhetoric of compassionate conservatism.
According to a study by the Stateline news agency, six Republican-controlled states have introduced legislation in language remarkably similar to the law targeting the homeless in Missouri. Tennessee and Texas are among the newest states to ban camping on state property. (It should be noted that measures that include warehousing America’s homeless population have also been passed by a handful of Democratic politicians, including Los Angeles mayoral candidate Rick Caruso and New York City mayor. , Eric Adams).
But even more consistent than the language of these bills is their viciousness. Cruelty has become the defining characteristic of modern Republican policy-making. From abortion bans that force 10-year-olds to cross state lines to terminate a pregnancy, to anti-LGBTQ legislation that makes it harder for children to access trans to gender-affirming health care or House Republicans refusing to support legislation codifying same-sex marriage, punitive and petty policies directed at the most vulnerable have become increasingly common.
Indeed, states with the most restrictive abortion bans are the most likely to offer the poorest social services. Mississippi, which is preparing to ban abortion, has some of the highest infant mortality and maternal mortality rates in the country. Yet the state still refuses to extend Medicaid to new mothers, and cash assistance for a poor mother raising two children is, at most, $260 a month, one of the lowest amounts in the nation.
None of this is exactly new. Red state Republicans have changed backstop programs for decades, and a handful of red states are still refusing to expand Medicaid more than 12 years after it was enacted. But whereas Republicans used to at least utter the rhetoric of compassionate conservatism, today they seem to delight in doing the opposite.
Increasingly, the cruelty of the GOP goes beyond politics. In a recent January 6 hearing, the House GOP Twitter feed attacked former Trump aide Sarah Matthews, who testified before the January 6 committee, as a “pawn” and a “liar,” even if she works for the House Republican Select Committee. on the climate crisis. (Those tweets were quickly deleted.)
Trump derided Cassidy Hutchinson, former assistant to White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and witness to the Jan. 6 committee, as a “girl” with “serious…mental issues.” The men who testified before the committee, including former deputy national security adviser Matt Pottinger, who sat next to Matthews during a public appearance before the committee, were mostly not mentioned .
Rep. Matt Gaetz used his speaking slot at a conservative conference to call women who support abortion rights “disgusting.”
Last week, Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., used his speaking slot at a conservative conference to call women who support abortion rights “disgusting” and too unattractive for anyone to want to have. sex with them. He even singled out and shamed a 19-year-old abortion rights supporter.
Mainstream Republicans now routinely mock Democrats as Communists and Marxists. They label those who push for the acceptance of LGBTQ children as “pedophiles” and “preparers”. Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that a party that kisses a man who bragged about grabbing women by the “p—” and insulting a Gold Star mother would do such a heel turn, but that does not make it any less disturbing.
There’s a meanness in the GOP’s attitude toward their perceived rivals that defines how Republicans approach the job of running the country. And if Trump’s speech this week is any indication, if he returns to the White House, the viciousness will only get worse.