Ian Buruma: MAGA’s Culture War Could Hurt Republicans

MAGA’s self-destructive ‘culture war’

NEW YORK — There are many reasons why, two years ago, the then US Vice-President and Democratic Party candidate Kamala Harris lost the presidential election to Donald Trump. Her election campaign got off to a late start. She inherited a huge amount of anger directed at US President Joe Biden. And Trump is a talented demagogue who knows how to exploit the rage and hostility fuelled by fear.

Donald Trump

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But Harris, a woman of colour, was also harmed by finding herself on the front line of the American culture war, which has reshaped the political landscape of several Western democracies. Although she tried to sidestep racial issues and focused on the economy, many people, often influenced by right-wing media, came to associate her with ‘progressive’ activism on issues of race, gender and sexual identity. This made it easy for the Republicans to claim that the Democrats had become out of touch with ‘ordinary Americans’.

Many of Trump’s voters, including women and many members of ethnic minorities, felt that the Democrats cared more about transgender rights than about jobs in the ‘Rust Belt’ cities of Ohio. This may have been unfair, as the Democratic Party leadership could hardly be described as a bastion of ‘enlightened’ activism. But it is true that, since the 1960s, the Democrats have been steadily losing the support of working-class voters.

Cultural and social issues, such as the fight against racism, LGBT rights and feminism, resonated with the educated elite in major coastal cities, but to a lesser extent with voters in rural areas and declining industrial towns. Right-wing populism has managed to draw many of these people into the Republican Party, which has played into the Republicans’ hands.

Since Trump won his second term, many liberal institutions in the US have been trying to distance themselves from the ‘culture war’. Universities have scaled back or even scrapped measures to promote diversity on their campuses. Some liberal media outlets have bowed to pressure from the Trump administration, curtailing critical reporting and entertainment programmes. CBS News, which once helped to stop Senator Joseph R. McCarthy from persecuting people for their alleged links to communists, has taken a sharp turn to the right under the leadership of its new editor-in-chief, Barry Weiss.

Democratic flip-flops and MAGA consistency

Of course, some Democratic politicians still espouse the very same extreme views that alienate many voters. In old social media posts, congressional candidate Dariлиза Avila Chevalier, the daughter of Dominican immigrants, called for the abolition of prisons, borders and the police, and spoke disparagingly about interracial relationships between white women and Black and Arab men. She later expressed regret at having published these views and deleted her account.

By contrast, Zoran Mamdani, Avila Chevalier’s fellow advocate of democratic socialism, was elected mayor of New York largely because he refrained from touching on such provocative topics. Instead, he focused on his pledge to make the city affordable again.

In fact, Avila Chevalier’s views are no more radical than those expressed by senior members of the Trump administration. Senior politicians from the MAGA camp have redoubled their efforts in the ‘culture war’, systematically punishing American institutions — from museums to universities — not only for implementing diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programmes, but also simply for promoting the idea that ethnic and religious diversity is a desirable phenomenon. Thousands of books that do not align with MAGA’s prejudices — including *The Diary of Anne Frank* — are being removed from state school libraries.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, Trump’s chief adviser on immigration policy, has helped to spread conspiracy theories claiming that white people are being displaced by non-white people. Along with other MAGA supporters, he has vilified immigrants, labelling them criminals and rapists, and organised the deportation of hundreds of thousands of people, including thousands of children, by heavily armed and poorly trained agents of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Who stands to gain from ‘cultural extremism’?

The only immigrants who received a warm welcome during Trump’s second term were white South Africans, victims of an alleged ‘genocide’. Pete Hegset, the self-proclaimed ‘Minister of War’, dismissed women and Black people from senior military posts and banned transgender people from serving in the army. In Hegset’s own words: ‘No fat people, no trans people, no bearded people, no oddballs, no weaklings, no radicals.’

The question now is which party will suffer greater damage from extremism in the context of the ‘culture war’. Polls suggest that MAGA fanaticism may not resonate beyond Trump’s loyal base. Latinos and so-called independent voters appear to be turning away from the Republican Party in the run-up to the November mid-term elections. Whilst Democratic activism has often been met with contempt, MAGA politics provokes fear and revulsion.

A June Gallup poll showed that 73 per cent of the US adult population still believe that immigration benefits the country, whilst only 21 per cent believe it harms it.

The Republicans also have problems that have nothing to do with the ‘culture war’: the endless, fruitless and extremely costly war in Iran, as well as Trump’s narcissism and the vast fortunes amassed by the president’s family and his inner circle.

Whilst in 2024 some voters felt that the Democrats were more concerned with issues of race and gender than with job losses, far more people may now believe that the president is more interested in having his name on public buildings than in ensuring national security.

All this suggests that the Democrats may be lucky enough to see Trump’s Republican Party self-destruct in November. But the Republican Party’s self-destruction alone is not enough; the Democrats must also give people a reason to vote for them. According to a July CNN poll, only 30 per cent of Americans view the Democratic Party favourably.

However, rather than responding to the extremism of the ‘MAGA’ movement with their own ‘culture war’, the Democrats should follow Mamdani’s example and focus on the economy. Although the administration’s attacks on immigrants and minorities are appalling, the Democrats would be wise not to rise to the provocation. The Republicans are their own worst enemies. Let them dig their own grave.