https://www.city-journal.org/article/conservatives-trump-anti-semitism-conspiracism-racialism
There is a moment in the life of every political movement when aspirations become reality, when the dissidents become the establishment.
For the Right, that moment is now. After the death of George Floyd in 2020, the Right functioned mostly as a dissident movement. It rallied opposition to coronavirus lockdowns, the radicalization of our institutions, and corruption in the federal government. With Donald Trump’s victory last year, however, this opposition movement earned an opportunity to become the new establishment.
I watched the process unfold behind the scenes. During the transition period, the incoming Trump administration’s best thinkers finalized their plans and, in many cases, announced them on Inauguration Day. Many of the ideas formed during the Right’s dissident period—including some of my own—suddenly became policy: abolishing the DEI bureaucracy, rescinding Lyndon Johnson’s executive order on affirmative action, dismantling the Department of Education. In the early months of this year, the feeling was triumphant.
The administration continues to do good work, but I’ve noticed a growing concern—more discussed in private than in public—about elements of the Right that have failed to make the transition. Since Inauguration Day, we’ve seen a splintering, especially in the media and intellectual worlds. Some have assumed the responsibilities that come with victory, while others prefer to remain as dissidents and, unfortunately, have fallen into various ideological rabbit holes.
Sometimes it’s a question of temperament. There will always be gadflies and pot-stirrers who fixate on criticism and grant trust only sparingly. My concern, however, is with a larger section of the Right that has proved vulnerable to three ideological trends: racialism, anti-Semitism, and conspiracism.