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Heather Cox Richardson: McCarthy and Trump - Fear of others
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/february-8-2026On February 9, 1950, Senator Joe McCarthy (R-WI) stood up in front of the Republican Women's Club of Wheeling, West Virginia, at a gathering to celebrate President Abraham Lincoln's birthday. The senator waved a piece of paper and later recalled telling the audience: "I have here in my hand a list of 205--a list of names that were made known to the Secretary of State as being members of the Communist Party and who nevertheless are still working and shaping policy in the State Department." He said he didn't have time to share the names of all those individuals, but he assured the audience that the Democratic administration of President Harry S. Truman was refusing to investigate "traitors in the government."
. . .
McCarthy's critics pointed out that he never produced any evidence of his wild claims, but their outrage gained far less attention than the claims themselves. He yelled, he made crazy accusations, he leaked fragments of truth that misrepresented reality, he hectored and badgered. He perfected the art of grabbing headlines and then staying ahead of the fact-checkers. By the time reporters called out his lies, they were already old news, and the fact checking got buried deep in the papers. The front page would have McCarthy's newest accusation.
. . .
On August 11, 2017, the influence of the Great Replacement theory on Americans burst into public awareness when racists, antisemites, white nationalists, Ku Klux Klan members, neo-Nazis, and other alt-right groups met in Charlottesville, Virginia, to "Unite the Right." They chanted "you will not replace us," "Jews will not replace us," and "blood and soil." In addition to that Nazi slogan, they gave Nazi salutes and carried Nazi insignia.
Rather than denouncing them, President Trump refused to condemn them, telling a reporter that there were "very fine people, on both sides." That statement marked Trump's open embrace of the far right that backed the Great Replacement theory, snaking it into public discourse through lies like the claims that former president Joe Biden had created "open borders" and that countries were sending "migrant criminals" to the U.S., and by repeating terms like "illegal monster," "killers," "gang members," "poisoning our country," "taking your jobs," and a dead giveaway: "the largest invasion in the history of our country."
. . .
. . .
McCarthy's critics pointed out that he never produced any evidence of his wild claims, but their outrage gained far less attention than the claims themselves. He yelled, he made crazy accusations, he leaked fragments of truth that misrepresented reality, he hectored and badgered. He perfected the art of grabbing headlines and then staying ahead of the fact-checkers. By the time reporters called out his lies, they were already old news, and the fact checking got buried deep in the papers. The front page would have McCarthy's newest accusation.
. . .
On August 11, 2017, the influence of the Great Replacement theory on Americans burst into public awareness when racists, antisemites, white nationalists, Ku Klux Klan members, neo-Nazis, and other alt-right groups met in Charlottesville, Virginia, to "Unite the Right." They chanted "you will not replace us," "Jews will not replace us," and "blood and soil." In addition to that Nazi slogan, they gave Nazi salutes and carried Nazi insignia.
Rather than denouncing them, President Trump refused to condemn them, telling a reporter that there were "very fine people, on both sides." That statement marked Trump's open embrace of the far right that backed the Great Replacement theory, snaking it into public discourse through lies like the claims that former president Joe Biden had created "open borders" and that countries were sending "migrant criminals" to the U.S., and by repeating terms like "illegal monster," "killers," "gang members," "poisoning our country," "taking your jobs," and a dead giveaway: "the largest invasion in the history of our country."
. . .
