Is the U.S. Heading for a Civil War? Scenarios for 2024-25

Abstract

This article applies symbolic politics theory to assess the risk of a new civil war in the U.S., finding that all of the factors making civil war likely are currently present. Narratives promoting hostility toward the other party are prominent among Republicans and Democrats alike, as are hostile predispositions and hostile feelings toward the other party. The Republican Party’s rejection of Trump’s 2020 election loss and its links to the January 6 coup attempt and to militia groups position it to organize a more violent insurrection in a scenario in which Trump is again the unsuccessful presidential nominee in 2024.

Acknowledgements

Thanks for comments on earlier drafts of this article go to Sam Jackson, Bob Pape, Arie Perliger, members of the University of Delaware Political Science Colloquium, and two anonymous reviewers.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Monica Duffy Toft, “How Civil Wars Start,” Foreign Policy February 18, 2021, https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/02/18/how-civil-wars-start/ (accessed February 11, 2022).

2 Stephen Marche, The Next Civil War: Dispatches from the American Future (New York: Avid Reader Press, 2022), 1.

3 Barbara F. Walter, How Civil Wars Start and How to Stop Them (New York: Crown, 2022), xviii.

4 In the period 2012–2021, 75% of extremist-related killings were carried out by right-wing extremists, as compared to 20% by domestic Islamist extremists and 4% by left-wing extremists. Anti-Defamation League, Murder and Extremism in the United States 2021, 7, https://www.adl.org/murder-and-extremism-2021 (accessed August 27, 2022).

5 Milja Kurki, Causation in International Relations: Reclaiming Causal Analysis (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008).

6 James D. Fearon and David Laitin, “Ethnicity, Insurgency and Civil War,” American Political Science Review 97, no. 1 (2003): 75–90.

7 Jack A. Goldstone, Robert H. Bates, David L. Epstein, Ted Robert Gurr, Michael B. Lustik, Monty G. Marshall, Jay Ulfelder and Mark Woodward, “A Global Model for Forecasting Political Instability,” American Journal of Political Science 54, no. 1 (2010): 196.

8 Ibid., 195–197, 204.

9 Walter, How Civil Wars Start, 67.

10 Walter’s term “ethnic entrepreneurs” is based on the concept of “political entrepreneurs” popularized in David A. Lake and Donald Rothchild, “Containing Fear: The Origins and Management of Ethnic Conflict,” International Security 21, no. 2 (1996), 41–75. A first-rate account of Serbian nationalism and Milosevic’s rise is V. P. Gagnon, Jr., The Myth of Ethnic War: Serbia and Croatia in the 1990s (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2006).

11 Walter, How Civil Wars Start, 108.

12 Stuart J. Kaufman, Modern Hatreds: The Symbolic Politics of Ethnic War (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2001); Stuart J. Kaufman, Nationalist Passions (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2015).

13 The US is ranked thirteenth in the world in GDP per capita. World Bank, https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.CD?most_recent_value_desc=true (accessed August 27, 2022).

14 Walter, How Civil Wars Start, 138.

15 Christopher Ingraham, “There Are More Guns than People in the United States, According to a New Study of Global Firearm Ownership,” Washington Post, June 19, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/06/19/there-are-more-guns-than-people-in-the-united-states-according-to-a-new-study-of-global-firearm-ownership/ (accessed August 27, 2022).

16 Walter, How Civil Wars Start, 142–153.

17 Marche, The Next Civil War, 10, 47–48, 99.

18 Eli J. Finkel, Christopher A. Bail, Mina Cikara, Peter H. Ditto, Shanto Iyengar, Samara Klar, Lilliana Mason, Mary C. McGrath, Brendan Nyhan, David G. Rand, Linda J. Skitka, Joshua A. Tucker, Jay J. Van Bavel, Cynthia S. Wang, and James N. Druckman, “Political Sectarianism in America,” Science 370, no. 6516 (2020): 533–536.

19 Brian Stelter, Hoax: Donald Trump, Fox News, and the Dangerous Distortion of Truth (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2020), 35–36.

20 Ibid., 41.

21 Ted Johnson, “Cable News Networks See Big Gains in Viewership During Tumultuous 2020,” Deadline, December 24, 2020, https://deadline.com/2020/12/ratings-cable-news-networks-2020-1234660751/ (accessed February 18, 2021).

22 John Gramlich, “5 Facts about Fox News,” Pew Research Center, April 8, 2020, https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/04/08/five-facts-about-fox-news/ (accessed August 27, 2022).

23 Kathleen Hall Jamieson and Joseph N. Cappella, Echo Chamber: Rush Limbaugh and the Conservative Media Establishment (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 65.

24 Stelter, Hoax, 38.

25 “Hannity,” October 23, 2018, https://archive.org/details/FOXNEWSW_20181024_010000_Hannity (accessed June 6, 2021).

26 John Whitehouse, “Laura Ingraham’s show used Rep. Ocasio-Cortez’s speech condemning sexism to fearmonger about Democrats,” Media Matters, July 24, 2020, https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham/laura-ingrahams-show-used-rep-ocasio-cortez-speech-condemning-sexism-fearmonger (accessed August 28, 2022).

27 “Fox’s Dan Bongino claims Democrats ‘are deliberately destroying American cities’,” Media Matters, June 29, 2021, https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/foxs-dan-bongino-claims-democrats-are-deliberately-destroying-american-cities

28 John Whitehouse and Katherine Abughazaleh, “Timeline: Fox News Misinformation 2020,” Media Matters, December 30, 2020, https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/timeline-fox-news-misinformation-2020 (accessed August 28, 2022).

29 “Hannity,” November 27, 2019, https://archive.org/details/TV-FOXNEWS (accessed June 6, 2021).

30 “Tucker Carlson: Democrats want ‘Demographic Replacement,’ with a ‘Flood of Illegals’ to Create ‘a Flood of Voters for Them’,” Media Matters, December 20, 2017, https://www.mediamatters.org/tucker-carlson/tucker-carlson-democrats-want-demographic-replacement-flood-illegals-create-flood (accessed June 6, 2021).

31 Casey Michel, “Fox News star Tucker Carlson’s ‘Great Replacement’ Segment Used a New Frame for an Old Fear,” ABCNews.com, April 12, 2021, https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/tucker-carlson-s-great-replacement-fox-news-segment-uses-newer-ncna1263880 (accessed June 6, 2021).

32 “Hannity,” February 4, 2021, https://archive.org/details/FOXNEWSW_20210205_060000_Hannity (accessed June 6, 2021).

33 “Ingraham Angle,” Dec. 2, 2019, https://archive.org/details/TV-FOXNEWS (accessed June 6, 2021).

34 “Hannity,” September 6, 2019, https://archive.org/details/FOXNEWSW_20190907_010000_Hannity (accessed June 6, 2021).

35 Whitehouse and Abughazaleh, “Timeline: Fox News Misinformation 2020.”

36 “Hannity,” Dec. 3, 2019, https://archive.org/details/TV-FOXNEWS (accessed June 6, 2021).

37 Whitehouse and Abughazaleh, “Timeline: Fox News Misinformation 2020.”

38 Ibid.

39 “The Next Revolution with Steve Hilton,” December 21, 2020, https://archive.org/details/FOXNEWSW_20201221_080000_The_Next_Revolution_With_Steve_Hilton (accessed June 6, 2021).

40 “Hannity,” December 17, 2020, https://archive.org/details/FOXNEWSW_20201217_020000_Hannity (accessed June 6, 2021).

41 Whitehouse and Abughazaleh, “Timeline: Fox News Misinformation 2020.”

42 Tyler Monroe and Rob Savillo, “Fox News has attacked Black Lives Matter over 400 times in a 6-month period,” Media Matters, May 26, 2021, https://www.mediamatters.org/black-lives-matter/fox-news-has-attacked-black-lives-matter-over-400-times-6-month-period (accessed August 27, 2022).

43 “Ingraham Angle, October 9, 2012, https://archive.org/details/FOXNEWSW_20181010_020000_The_Ingraham_Angle (accessed June 6, 2021).

44 “Fox Host: If Protests Continue, ‘that Second Amendment Starts Looking Miraculous’,” Media Matters, September 21, 2020, https://www.mediamatters.org/dana-perino/fox-host-if-protests-continue-second-amendment-starts-looking-miraculous (accessed August 28, 2022).

45 Whitehouse and Abughazaleh, “Timeline: Fox News Misinformation 2020.”

46 Ibid.

47 Ibid.

48 Ibid.

49 Sarah Palin seems to have been first in articulating the idea that Republicans represent the “real America.” See George Packer, “How America Fractured Into Four Parts,” The Atlantic, July/August 2021.

50 Yphtach Lelkes and Sean J. Westwood, “The Limits of Partisan Prejudice,” Journal of Politics 79, no. 2 (2016): 485–501; Finkel et al., “Political Sectarianism in America;” Shanto Iyengar, Gaurav Sood, and Yphtach Lelkes, “Affect, Not Ideology: A Social Identity Perspective on Polarization,” Public Opinion Quarterly 76, no. 3, (2012): 405–431; and Alan I. Abramowitz and Steven W. Webster, “Negative Partisanship: Why Americans Dislike Parties But Behave Like Rabid Partisans,” Advances in Political Psychology 39, Suppl. 1 (2018): 119–135.

51 Iyengar, Sood, and Lelkes, “Affect, Not Ideology,” 690.

52 American National Election Survey, https://electionstudies.org/ (accessed August 27, 2022).

53 Pew Research Center, “Partisanship and Political Animosity 2026,” https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2016/06/22/1-feelings-about-partisans-and-the-parties/ (accessed August 27, 2022).

54 Pew Research Center, “Partisan Antipathy.”

55 Ezra Klein and Alvin Chang, "’Political Identity Is Fair Game for Hatred’: How Republicans and Democrats Discriminate,” Vox.com, December 7, 2015, https://www.vox.com/2015/12/7/9790764/partisan-discrimination (accessed August 28, 2022).

56 Ibid.

57 Erin C. Cassese, “Partisan Dehumanization in American Politics,” Political Behavior 43, no. 1 (2021): 29–50.

58 Nathan P. Kalmoe and Lilliana Mason, Lethal Mass Partisanship: Prevalence, Correlates, & Electoral Contingencies,” Prepared for presentation at the January 2019 NCAPSA American Politics Meeting, 20.

59 Finkel et al. “Political Sectarianism in America.”

60 David Neiwert, Alt-America: The Rise of the Radical Right in the Age of Trump (London: Verso, 2017), 47.

61 Daniel A. Cox, “After the Ballots Are Counted: Conspiracies, Political Violence, and American Exceptionalism,” American Survey Center 2021, https://www.americansurveycenter.org/research/after-the-ballots-are-counted-conspiracies-political-violence-and-american-exceptionalism/ (accessed August 29, 2022).

62 Abramowitz and Webster, “Negative Partisanship,” 125.

63 Philip Klinkner, “The Easiest Way to Guess if Someone Supports Trump? Ask if Obama is a Muslim,” Vox, June 2, 2016 https://www.vox.com/2016/6/2/11833548/donald-trump-support-race-religion-economy (accessed August 29, 2022).

64 “Majority Says the Federal Government Threatens Their Personal Rights,” Pew Research Center, https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2013/01/31/majority-says-the-federal-government-threatens-their-personal-rights/ (accessed January 10, 2021).

65 “Ipsos Poll: Nativism Topline 5.27.2016,” https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/news_and_polls/2015-12/NativismTopline%2012282015.pdf (accessed January 10, 2021).

66 Kalmoe and Mason, “Lethal Mass Partisanship,” p. 19.

67 Michael Dimock and Richard Wike, “America Is Exceptional in the Nature of its Political Divide,” Pew Research, November 13, 2020, https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/11/13/america-is-exceptional-in-the-nature-of-its-political-divide/ (accessed January 10, 2021).

68 Neiwert, Alt-America, 48.

69 Chris Cillizza, “Three-quarters of Republicans believe a lie about the 2020 election,” CNN, February 4, 2020, https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/04/politics/2020-election-donald-trump-voter-fraud/index.html (accessed August 28, 2022).

70 Kalmoe and Mason, “Lethal Mass Partisanship,” p. 32.

71 Larry M. Bartels, “Ethnic antagonism erodes Republicans’ commitment to democracy,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117, no. 37 (2020): 22752–22759. Cf. Daniel A. Cox, “After the ballots are counted: Conspiracies, political violence, and American exceptionalism,” American Survey Research Center, February 11, 2021, https://www.americansurveycenter.org/research/after-the-ballots-are-counted-conspiracies-political-violence-and-american-exceptionalism/ (accessed August 28, 2022).

72 Robert O’Harrow Jr., Andrew Ba Tran and Derek Hawkins, “The Rise of Domestic Extremism in America,” Washington Post, April 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/interactive/2021/domestic-terrorism-data/ (accessed August 298, 2022).

73 Arie Perliger, American Zealots: Inside Right-Wing Domestic Terrorism (New York: Columbia University Press), 18–26.

74 Southern Poverty Law Center, The Year in Hate and Extremism 2020, 40, https://www.splcenter.org/news/2021/02/01/year-hate-2020?gclid=CjwKCAjw3qGYBhBSEiwAcnTRLud-ntsBWSN8lKqzdl4IDltFL4kKPCVxvzc78ChfiIpNXta9_oJD3xoCSgEQAvD_BwE (accessed August 26, 2022).

75 On embrace of Great Replacement theory, see Cynthia Miller-Idriss, Hate in the Homeland: The New Global Far Right (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2020), 11.

76 JJ MacNab, “Assessing the Threat from Accelerationists and Militia Extremists,” Testimony Before the Subcommittee on Intelligence and Counterterrorism, Committee on Homeland Security, July 16, 2020, https://homeland.house.gov/imo/media/doc/Testimony%20-%20MacNab.pdf (accessed August 28, 2022).

77 Cloee Cooper, Ethan Fauré, and Olivia Lawrence-Weilmann, “Mapping Far-Right and Anti-Immigrant Movement Alignment with County Sheriffs,” Political Research Associates, September 14, 2020, https://politicalresearch.org/2020/09/14/mapping-far-right-and-anti-immigrant-movement-alignment-county-sheriffs (accessed August 26, 2022).

78 Marche, The Next Civil War, pp. 47–48.

79 Niewert, Alt-America, pp. 164, 168, 173; Sam Jackson, Oath Keepers: Patriotism and the Edge of Violence in a Right-Wing Antigovernment Group (New York: Columbia University Press, 2020, 46.

80 Niewert, Alt-America, 174-77, 186-87, 197.

81 “Have Hate, Will Travel: The Demographics of Unite the Right,” Anti-Defamation League, October 8, 2017, https://www.adl.org/blog/have-hate-will-travel-the-demographics-of-unite-the-right (accessed August 28, 2022).

82 Hanna Kozlowska, “Who Were the Armed, Camouflaged Men in Charlottesville Who Have Nothing to do with the Military?” Quartz, August 15, 2017, https://qz.com/1053604/who-were-the-armed-camouflaged-men-in-charlottesville-who-have-nothing-to-do-with-the-military/ (accessed August 29, 2022).

83 Sam Jackson, “Don’t Assume the Militias at the Charlottesville Rally Were White Supremacists. This Is What They Believe Now,” Washington Post, September 8, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/09/08/remember-those-militias-at-the-charlottesville-unite-the-right-rally-heres-what-they-believe/ (accessed August 28, 2022).

84 Ian Shapira, “Inside Jason Kessler’s Hate-Fueled Rise,” Washington Post, August 11, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/inside-jason-kesslers-hate-fueled-rise/2018/08/11/335eaf42-999e-11e8-b60b-1c897f17e185_story.html (accessed August 28, 2022).

85 Perliger, American Zealots, 46.

86 Marche, The Next Civil War, 3 and passim.

87 Luke O’Brien, “How Republican Politics (and Twitter) Created Ali Alexander, The Man Behind ‘Stop The Steal’,” Huffington Post, March 7, 2021, https://www.huffpost.com/entry/republicans-twitter-ali-alexander-stop-the-steal_n_6026fb26c5b6f88289fbab57t (accessed August 28, 2022).

88 Ibid.

89 Ibid.

90 Stephanie Mencimer, “How a Feud Between Two Tea Party Leaders Helped Lay the Groundwork for the Capitol Insurrection: The road to sedition,” Mother Jones, April 19, 2021, https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2021/04/how-a-feud-between-2-tea-party-leaders-helped-lay-the-groundwork-for-the-capitol-insurrection/ (accessed August 28, 2022).

91 Associated Press, “‘This isn’t over!’: Trump Supporters Refuse to Accept Defeat,” November 7, 2020, https://kstp.com/news/biden-win-sparks-smattering-of-protests-most-stay-peaceful/5918155/ (accessed June 6, 2021).

92 Mencimer, “How a Feud Between Two Tea Party Leaders.”

93 Marissa J. Lang and Peter Hermann, “Far-Right Protesters, Counterdemonstrators Plan to Gather Saturday in D.C. Amid Pro-Trump Rallies, Washington Post, November 12, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/maga-dc-protests/2020/11/12/ca7a16fc-2455-11eb-8672-c281c7a2c96e_story.html (accessed August 28, 2022).

94 Joshua Kaplan and Joaquin Sapien, “New Details Suggest Senior Trump Aides Knew Jan. 6 Rally Could Get Chaotic,” Pro Publica, https://www.propublica.org/article/new-details-suggest-senior-trump-aides-knew-jan-6-rally-could-get-chaotic (accessed August 28, 2022).

95 James Gordon, “MAGA Supporters Chant ‘Stop the Steal’ as They Gather in Florida to Kick-Off Two-Week March For Trump Bus Tour in the Swing States he Lost to Biden,” Daily Mail, November 29, 2020, https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8999635/Trump-supporters-gather-kick-March-Trump-bus-tour-two-week-multi-state-rally.html (accessed August 6, 6021).

96 Joseph Tanfani, Michael Berens, and Ned Parker, “How Trump’s Pied Pipers Rallied a Faithful Mob to the Capitol,” Reuters, January 11, 2021, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-protest-organizers-insight/how-trumps-pied-pipers-rallied-a-faithful-mob-to-the-capitol-idUSKBN29G2UP (accessed August 6, 6021).

97 Mencimer, “How a Feud Between Two Tea Party Leaders.”

98 Emilie Davies, Rachel Weiner, Clarence Williams, Marissa J. Lang, and Jessica Contrera, “Multiple People Stabbed After Thousands Gather for Pro-Trump Demonstrations in Washington,” Washington Post, December 11, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trump-dc-rally-maga/2020/12/11/8b5af818-3bdb-11eb-bc68-96af0daae728_story.html (accessed August 28, 2022).

99 “Did Trump Incite the Riots? Only with the Help of Big Tech,” Sum of Us, https://www.sumofus.org/images/SOU_TrumpTechRiot_Report.pdf (accessed August 28, 2022).

100 Kyle Cheney, “New Evidence Suggests ‘Alliance’ Between Oath Keepers, Proud Boys Ahead of Jan. 6,” Yahoo.com, March 24, 2021, https://www.yahoo.com/now/evidence-suggests-alliance-between-oath-080819913.html (accessed August 28, 2022).

101 Kaplan and Sapien, “New Details Suggest Senior Trump Aides Knew;” Robert O’Harrow, Jr., “Rallies ahead of Capitol riot were Planned by Established Washington Insiders” Washington Post, January 17, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/capitol-rally-organizers-before-riots/2021/01/16/c5b40250-552d-11eb-a931-5b162d0d033d_story.html (accessed August 28, 2022).

102 Jemima McEvoy, “‘President Trump Has Called’: Supporters Plan D.C. Rally to Overturn His Loss on Day Congress Certifies Election,” Forbes, December 23, 2020, https://www.forbes.com/sites/jemimamcevoy/2020/12/23/president-trump-has-called-supporters-plan-dc-rally-to-overturn-his-loss-on-day-congress-certifies-election/?sh=8e4f8ed4c9b3 (accessed August 28, 2022).

103 Kaplan and Sapien, “New Details Suggest Senior Trump Aides Knew.”

104 Anna Massoglia, “Shell Companies and ‘Dark Money’ May Hide Details of Trump ties to DC Protests,” OpenSecrets.org, January 22, 2021, https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2021/01/trump-tied-to-dc-protests-dark-money-and-shell-companies/ (accessed August 28, 2022).

105 O’Harrow, “Rallies ahead of Capitol riot.”

106 O’Brien, “How Republican Politics (And Twitter) Created Ali Alexander;” Jeremy W. Peters, “The Three Types of Republicans Donald Trump Created,” New York Times January 21, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/21/us/politics/trump-republican-party.html (accessed August 28, 2022).

107 Mark Follman and Dan Friedman, “January 6 Conspiracy Case Deepens Against Oath Keepers,” Mother Jones, June 2, 2021, https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2021/06/january-6-conspiracy-congress-insurrection-oath-keepers-trump-roger-stone/ (accessed August 28, 2022).

108 David Smith, “The January 6 Panel said Trump Incited an ‘Attempted Coup’. Will it Kill Him or Make Him Stronger?” The Guardian, June 11, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/jun/11/jan-6-hearings-capitol-attack-trump-coup-analysis (accessed August 27, 2022).

109 Amy Gardner and Isaac Arnsdorf, “More than 100 GOP Primary Winners Back Trump’s False Fraud Claims,” Washington Post, June 14, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/14/more-than-100-gop-primary-winners-back-trumps-false-fraud-claims/ (accessed August 28, 2022).

110 Amy Gardner, Election Deniers March Toward Power in Key 2024 Battlegrounds,” The Washington Post, August 15, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/08/15/election-deniers-march-toward-power-key-2024-battlegrounds/ (accessed September 3, 2022).

111 Robert A. George, “The RNC Is Still All in for Trump,” Bloomberg.com, January 11, 2021, https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-01-11/rip-rnc-republican-national-committee-still-all-in-for-trump (accessed June 6, 2021).

112 New York Times, June 19, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/19/us/politics/texas-republicans-approve-far-right-platform-declaring-bidens-election-illegitimate.html?searchResultPosition=1 (accessed August 28, 2022).

113 David D. Kirkpatrick and Mike McIntire, “‘Its Own Domestic Army’: How the G.O.P. Allied Itself With Militants,” New York Times, February 8, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/08/us/militias-republicans-michigan.html (accessed June 6, 2021).

114 Katie Meyer, “‘Stalin-like cancel culture’: Infighting among Pa. GOP pits ‘Never Trumpers’ against loyalists,” WHYY.org, February 19, 2021, https://whyy.org/articles/stalin-like-cancel-culture-infighting-among-pa-gop-pits-never-trumpers-against-loyalists/ (accessed June 6, 2021).

115 Alison Durkee, “Pennsylvania GOP Narrowly Declines to Censure Sen. Pat Toomey for Voting to Convict Trump,” Forbes.com, March 2, 2021, https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisondurkee/2021/03/02/pennsylvania-gop-narrowly-declines-to-censure-sen-pat-toomey-for-voting-to-convict-trump/?sh=6cf7ee073181 (accessed June 6, 2021).

116 Bill Glauber, “Andrew Hitt to Step Down as Chairman of Republican Party of Wisconsin,” Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, July 28, 2021, https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/2021/07/28/andrew-hitt-step-down-chairman-republican-party-wisconsin/5379513001/ (accessed August 28, 2022).

117 O’Brien, “How Republican Politics (And Twitter) Created Ali Alexander.”

118 Rachel Janfaza and Deanna Hackney, “Kemp booed and Raffensperger Censured at Georgia GOP Convention,” CNN.com, June 5, 2021, https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/05/politics/brad-raffensperger-brian-kemp-georgia-republican-convention/index.html (accessed August 28, 2022).

119 Olafimihan Oshin, “6 in 10 Republicans say Trump should be 2024 GOP nominee: survey,” The Hill, August 28, 2022, https://thehill.com/homenews/3618737-6-in-10-republicans-say-trump-should-be-2024-gop-nominee-survey/ (accessed September 1, 2022).

120 Glenn Kessler, “Trump made 30,573 false or Misleading Claims as President. Nearly Half Came in his Final Year,” Washington Post, January 23, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-fact-checker-tracked-trump-claims/2021/01/23/ad04b69a-5c1d-11eb-a976-bad6431e03e2_story.html (accessed August 28, 2022).

121 Brian Naylor, “Read Trump’s Jan. 6 Speech, A Key Part Of Impeachment Trial,” NPR.org, February 20, 2021, https://www.npr.org/2021/02/10/966396848/read-trumps-jan-6-speech-a-key-part-of-impeachment-trial (accessed August 28, 2022).

122 “Most Republicans still believe 2020 election was stolen from Trump – poll,” Guardian, May 24, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/may/24/republicans-2020-election-poll-trump-biden (accessed August 28, 2022).

123 Erica R. Hendry, “Trump asked Russia to find Clinton’s emails. On or around the same day, Russians targeted her accounts,” PBS.org, July 13, 2018, https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trump-asked-russia-to-find-clintons-emails-on-or-around-the-same-day-russians-targeted-her-accounts (accessed August 28, 2022).

124 Allan Smith, “Bolton Doubles Down on Trump Obstruction Claims amid Bipartisan Backlash,” NBCNews.com, June 21, 2020, https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/bolton-doubles-down-trump-obstruction-claims-amid-bipartisan-backlash-n1231670 (accessed August 28, 2022).

125 David Shepardson, “Trump Praises Chinese President Extending Tenure ‘for Life’,” Reuters, March 3, 2018, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-trump-china/trump-praises-chinese-president-extending-tenure-for-life-idUSKCN1GG015 (accessed August 28, 2022).

126 E.J. Dionne Jr., “Trump’s ‘12 More Years’ Shout Shows What he has in Common with Autocrats,” Washington Post, August 24, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/08/24/republicans-are-one-man-party/ (accessed August 28, 2022).

127 Jason K. Dempsey, Our Army: Soldiers, Politics, and American Civil-Military Relations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010), 75.

128 Marche, The Next Civil War, 60.

129 Thomas Hegghammer, “Cheese Bells and Foreign Fighting,” War on the Rocks, August 6, 2021, https://warontherocks.com/2021/08/foreign-fighters-and-cheese-bells/ (accessed August 26, 2022).

130 Marche, The Next Civil War, 158.

131 Ibid., 161.

132 Walter, How Civil Wars Start, 97.

133 Nusaiba Mizan, “Texas Republicans want a vote on ‘Texas Independence.’ But Can Texas Secede from the Union?” Politifact, June 27, 2022, https://www.politifact.com/article/2022/jun/27/texas-republicans-want-vote-texas-independence-can/ (accessed September 1, 2022).