An Open Letter To The 17 Sane Congressional Republicans

Democrats, you can listen too.

Image by Agriphoto via Wikimedia Commons.

Hello.

There’s no time, so let’s cut right to it: You are not a part of Trump and Musk’s plan. Not ever again, not even a little bit. If you don’t move against them, and fast, you are screwed.

You might have been a part of the plan at one point, but now that Elon has purchased the presidency, you’re out. The assertion that Trump can just write executive orders and enact laws without Congress? That’s not to circumvent the Democrats. They’re a minority in both houses. The Trump Administration is saying that they don’t need Congress to pass laws so they can bypass you. You are not just nonessential now; you are in the way.

Trump and Musk are not establishing the permanent Republican majority (Fascism Lite™) you have been trying to make happen for the past few decades.^¹ They are establishing a dictatorship with a sprinkling of billionaire oligarchs. Anyone that doesn’t fit that bill — especially someone who might be a competitor for leadership and public trust — is on their way out. And anyone who isn’t a die-hard Mump lackey is out even faster. Hey, that’s you!

(If you are a woman, you should already be on the phone to a Democratic colleague. Look at what Musk has done to NASA and the Coast Guard. He and his techbro fascists don’t think you belong in public life at all. Throw them out before they go full Taliban.)

Remember how the Li’l DOGEies spent the past couple of weeks figuring out how to turn off government payments to programs and agencies they don’t like? They can also do that to your paycheck and they have your home address. Move together and move quickly.

I wrote a warning to your colleagues in the Democratic party a week ago. I will now admit that I greatly underestimated the danger. If you like living in a representative democracy, if you like having some measure of power within it, and if you would rather not be ousted in a humiliating and physically dangerous way, you are going to have to do some things you won’t enjoy.

1. You’re going to have to take stock of who you are.

This is a fascist coup, led by Donald Trump and a man who gave a fascist salute behind the presidential seal and sent Li’l Nazis into our most sensitive government systems. There is no more equivocating about who the bad guys are. There is no more hedging your bets. You have three choices: You are a hero, a villain, or one of the pathetic stooges who are letting the villains roll over the country.

You know how much Americans love making fun of Neville Chamberlain? You are already worse. You have been defending, appeasing, and abetting a dictator in your own country. You won’t be able to deny or explain away collaboration or inaction. Everyone will know what you did and didn’t do. The Internet is forever, no matter how frantically you try to scrub it. Your family and friends will all know that you had the last, best chance to stop a fascist dictator and did nothing.

If you don’t fight now, you will be the relative they whisper about … or deny being related to at all. Have you ever known a family who discovered Grandpa’s Klan robes in the back of a closet after he died, heard the shame in the way they talk about him? That’s how your loved ones will talk about you if you don’t fight back. Some of them will change their last names to try to scrape off the stink.

If you can’t bring yourself to fight for your country or for the dignity of your office, fight for the way your family will remember you. Decide who you are before the momentum decides for you.

2. You’re going to have to be brave.

I am truly sorry that you have been receiving death threats. Trump is a thug and a mobster at his core. But Trump is also a conman, and he is using a classic conman’s game on you: creating short-term fear to get you to make bad long-term decisions.

But you are not safe if Trump and Musk get their tandem-bike dictatorship. Again, you will be seen as a pro-democracy rival to their complete power, and as someone who has already failed the rah-rah test. Just because you’re going to get purged after your Democratic colleagues doesn’t mean you won’t be purged. You cannot stay on the good side of a fascist regime — they constantly need new transgressors to punish, and you’re already two strikes down. One day you will slip up, if you are allowed to stick around at all.

I recommend keeping in mind that Trump likes to publicly humiliate people when he discards them, and he will no longer have anything holding back his worst urges.

Get your family somewhere safe. The deeper-pocketed among you might consider sponsoring temporary extra private security for everyone else.²

Bring all threats to light, each and every one, especially if you can do it as a group. Threats are trickier to make in the daylight. Keep records and refer all of them to law enforcement, whether it’s from crackpots or someone closer to the top. Stick together and make noise. And remember all the journalists and private citizens who have also gotten death threats for speaking out against Trump and Musk. You are in good company.

If you still can’t find the courage to impeach Trump or go on the record as a no for his nominees, you need to get the hell out. If you want to resign, fine. Temporarily breaking the Republican majority would at least be a step. But it would be better to retain your seat and have a “medical crisis” or a “family emergency” that keeps you away from crucial votes while the Democrats do the heavy lifting.

Those that have the courage to stay and do what’s right, take a head count and start reaching across the aisle.

3. You’re going to have to work with the Democrats.

The good news is that this is urgent enough that you can put off the part where you eat crow and apologize until later, and maybe forever if things get exciting enough. Line up the votes — or drop enough Republicans from the tally — to impeach, confirm numbers with the Democrats, and move. It will be like a buddy action movie with fewer car chases and more wingtips. (While you’re counting, remember that you can’t trust Tillis.)

No negotiating, no screwing around. Impeach immediately. Just pick one of the 3,000 constitutional violations he committed before breakfast today and GO GO GO GO GO. Call the Capitol Police and physically get Musk and his Nazlings out of whatever building they’re in. Hell, you have the power of the purse; shut off the electricity and water. It’s efficient.

Doesn’t Elon like games that involve cutting off expected payments? Yank his government contracts. Last time I checked, it’s illegal for one contractor to look at a competing government contractor’s information. Musk’s team has looked at everything. And that’s not even counting the security violations and the treason and the sabotage! Take away his government billions and see how snappy those fascist salutes are.

For chrissakes, some of you have committee chairs. Work with the Democrats and USE THEM. Turn off the money faucet. Maybe slam through some regulations for the entire crypto industry as a treat.³ This will have the added benefit of taking the fangs out of Musk’s threat to fund a primary challenger for anyone who crosses him.⁴ (Should we ever have another election, which is increasingly unlikely every moment you hesitate.)

Are there state attorneys general who have reason to bring criminal charges and seize assets? Good. I heard somewhere that flooding the zone is a good strategy.

4. You’re going to have to keep moving even when you want it to be over.

There will be a temptation to stop after you have removed Trump and Musk. You cannot. JD Vance is 1000 percent in on this. He just spent the weekend claiming that separation of powers is not a thing and he and Trump don’t have to listen to judges at all if they really don’t want to. And you’ll notice that Vance’s leash isn’t being held by Trump — it leads back to Peter Thiel, who is what Musk would be if he were smart enough to stay in the shadows. That’s a bad metaphor, really. Vance isn’t really Thiel’s lapdog. He’s more like a growth on Thiel’s thigh. Get him out.

Pam Bondi — at a minimum — also has to go if you want the investigations and charges you need. Keep gathering evidence, keep prying out all the rot, whip up some healthy smoothies and keep impeaching.

At least it will be juicy and contentious enough to get an appropriate level of coverage from the media.

If you can’t do it because it’s right, do it because the only hope for your political career is a) stopping the coup and b) being seen as a bipartisan firebrand instead of a passive collaborator or a Gaetz-adjacent treasonous slimeball. So get on that.

5. You’re going to have to bring Fox News to heel.

Fox News, in keeping with its mission of lying on behalf of the Republican Party (oh, yes, we noticed), is assuming that the GOP is in its usual lockstep and they need to keep talking about how good and wonderful Mister Trump is lest he send a Fox anchor to the cornfield. Sit Rupert down and let him know that it’s time to choose between the fascists who are actively trying to wreck the economy and good old-fashioned rapacious conservatism.⁵

Does he really want his network known as The Explicit Choice of Fascism? Would that perhaps affect his media empire and income across the globe? Ask him to look up Tesla sales in France while he thinks about it.

6. You’re going to have to impose real consequences.

Remember a few years ago when the president and several of your colleagues tried to have you murdered by a whipped-up mob? And then instead of any meaningful consequences, most of the Republican Party decided it would be better if they refused to see or punish the obvious wrongdoing? How did that work out for you?

You can’t let them off because you work with them and gosh, they were such a hoot during the big pickleball tournament. This is not a more vitriolic legislative session than usual; this is a coup. And one that confirms that the last time was also an attempted coup. These lunatics will keep trying, again and again, until they either receive the punishment they deserve or they succeed in elevating a dictator. Work with the Democrats, start expelling, and support treason charges.

Party over country is endangering us all. Stop trying to save face for the GOP. It’s been turned into the party of cheats, racists, rapists, thieves, and fascists. If that pains you, well, remember that when the racists and fascists showed up at the door, the modern Republican Party let them in and offered milk and cookies. And all to stay in power just a little longer.

Assuming we ever have another election, you cannot run as a Republican again without the stench of Donald Trump and his crazed-eel Cabinet nominees and Musk and his Nazi lackeys and this filthy coup all over you. You’re going to have to run as you, and the nation will learn who you really are as you deal — or fail to deal — with the fascists who are actively trying to destroy our Republic.

Yes, this is awful. But you ran for this office with the implicit promise that you would step up in a crisis, even if the game hasn’t been played that way for quite some time.

The good news is that Trump and Musk do not have a compliant public and are both absolute chickenshits at heart. They are also — take a deep breath and say some obvious truths about fellow conservatives right out loud — vain, impulsive, easily manipulated, and very, very stupid.

We can do this. You can take stock of everything else later.

But you have to move, and you have to move now.

Good luck to us all.

This post appeared at Ali Davis’s Beehiiv, and she said do you want to reprint it and we said fuck yeah.

1. When all this is over, you might take a quiet moment to think about whether gerrymandering, voter suppression, and lies about election fraud have been bad for democracy and what you might do about fixing that.

2. When all this is over, look up “mutual aid.” It’s something ordinary United States citizens do when our rapacious health insurance industry bankrupts someone for the crime of, say, getting cancer. You might think about fixing that.

3. When all this is over, you might cogitate on whether it’s a good idea to have entire industry that’s all about handy untraceable fake currency for tax cheats, human traffickers, and drug lords, and also how you might go about fixing that.

4. When all this is over, you might consider whether it has really been a good idea to have enormous dark-money super PACs and how you might go about fixing that. If you’re really pulling out all the stops, you might also think about whether we really need to let individuals go so untaxed and get so wealthy that one guy can swing an entire election just with the change he vacuums out of his terrible and very flammable trucks.

5. When all this is over, you might do some mulling about whether having a one-party network that has repeatedly been caught spreading both willful distortions of facts and outright lies is a good thing for the country. It’s certainly not good for you. Fox News has made your colleagues unable to deal with reality instead of their own set of party-written, spoon-fed talking points.