Donald Trump clearly tried to destroy US democracy. Yet Republicans may still back him for President in 2024 – Scotsman comment

Former President Donald Trump addresses a rally in Des Moines, Iowa, in October last year (Picture: Scott Olson/Getty Images)

According to explosive evidence by a former White House aide, Cassidy Hutchinson, Trump administration officials were warned of the potential for violence before a mob of his supporters stormed the US Capitol on January 6 last year.

Speaking to the US Congressional committee investigating the attack, Hutchinson also said that Trump knew some people at a rally near the White House were carrying guns and other weapons when he urged them to march on the Capitol, where Congress was formally approving the election of Joe Biden as US President. “We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore,” Trump told them.

Hutchinson quoted another official as saying that, after hearing the rioters were calling for the then Vice-President, Mike Pence, to be hanged for refusing to co-operate with attempts to overturn the election, Trump thought Pence deserved it and did not believe the rioters were doing anything wrong.

Trump still refuses to accept that he lost the election. And yet, astonishingly, he still remains a leading contender for the Republican party’s nomination for the next one, due in November 2024, while pro-Trump officials are being elected to political office across the country.

There is a real possibility that the party of Abraham Lincoln, of Ronald Reagan and John McCain, will ask Americans to vote for the man who tried to destroy US democracy. And if they do, his chances of success, on his second attempt, would be much greater.