The Most Powerful Far Right Party

It’s apparent that the GOP strategy for the coming midterm elections is to go all in on a racist, xenophobic anti-immigrant strategy combined with touting the tax cuts and the economy. In going down this route, the Republican party has truly become entirely the party of Trump.

In many respects, the core of the Republican party is now almost identical to the illiberal far-right parties in Europe which are focused on the exclusion or expulsion of both legal and illegal immigrants. Rhetorically, both the far right in Europe and the GOP are anti-elite and anti-establishment. In Europe, the target of those attacks is the EU and here it is the Washington “swamp”. In addition, these parties both share the language of protectionism, with Brexit being the best manifestation of that policy. With Trump and the Republicans, however, the language of protectionism has so far not been followed up with any real concrete action, unless you consider Trump’s efforts at mass deportation a protectionist measure.

The economic policies of the far right are secondary and mainly complementary to the ethnic nationalism that is the primary message and reflected in the primary economic goal of withdrawal from the EU. In general, these parties, like the GOP, believe in “law and order”, deregulation, and cutting back on the welfare state which they believe support the unwanted immigrants. But they are not monolithic in that regard. In France, the National Front has called for a minimum wage and the re-nationalization of the agriculture sector. 

Perhaps the biggest difference between the far-right parties in Europe and the GOP is driven by the nature of American electoral politics. Whereas the European parties really are focused on nationalism and the withdrawal from the EU, their economic positions are either supportive of that task or posturing for election purposes. On the other hand, the Republican party is far more focused on satisfying the plutocratic donors that provide the grease for their electoral machine. I don’t believe there is one far-right European party that would have supported the GOP tax bill. The idea that major corporations could repatriate profits at a substantial discount or multinational corporations that offshore jobs should actually get a tax cut is just the kind of elitist “special favors” that those parties rail against.

So, while believers in a liberal democracy are aghast at what is happening in Hungary and Poland these days, I think we should all recognize that the most politically powerful far right party in the West these days is actually the Republican party. And that party is pursuing seemingly contradictory goals – white nationalism and support of the plutocratic class.