Donald Trump lit fuse to a riot and burned down his house

No person has been more loyal to Donald Trump than Vice-President Mike Pence. Picture: Getty Images

Donald Trump has waited until the very end to make one of his biggest mistakes. No one who was in the crowd hearing him speak outside the White House, as I was, could possibly misinterpret what he wanted his supporters to do.

He fired them up for more than an hour with conspiracy theories about why a great electoral fraud had been perpetrated upon them, then told them to march to the Capitol building, urging them to “fight like hell … this is a time for strength”.

Maybe Trump didn’t actually expect them to break into the building, but when you whip an enormous crowd into an angry frenzy, you can hardly throw your hands in the air when things get out of hand.

Tens of thousands of Trump supporters from around the country, including militant far-right groups such as the Proud Boys, were hardly going to be satisfied with listening to a speech and then going home quietly.

Although Trump has refused to condemn what he calls the “great patriots” who stormed the Capitol, he will quickly realise the damage he has done to himself. Trump may have torpedoed any hopes he had — if, indeed, he had them — of running for president in 2024. He may even have surrendered his hopes of remaining a kingmaker in the Republican Party. While a hard core of loyalists will love this Trump-driven insurrection, the rest of America will be aghast. This does not just include Democrats but also a vast portion of Republicans and other conservatives who will draw a line on Trump’s two-month war on democracy that culminated in this deadly riot in Washington.

Look at the roll call of Republicans who directly or indirectly condemned Trump, from former president George W. Bush to a raft of once pro-Trump senators and congressmen. “You are done and your legacy will be a disaster,” representative Adam Kinzinger tweeted as he escaped the Capitol.

Ever since it became clear Joe Biden won the election, Republicans have tried hard to back Trump’s unproven claims of massive election fraud. This was partly through loyalty and partly because of fear of alienating a powerful president. But as the courts progressively stripped those claims of any validity, and as states certified their results, Republicans have increasingly struggled to keep up the charade of fraud Trump demands.

The President’s response has been to burn everyone in his party who eventually disagreed, no matter how loyal they have been.

Take Senate leader Mitch McConnell, who stood faithfully by Trump for four years but who Trump now says has failed him because he had the audacity to admit Biden won the election.

And what about Vice-President Mike Pence? No person has been more loyal to Trump. But when Trump realised Pence was his last hope of overturning the election result — through an unconstitutional act of rejecting the electoral college vote in congress — he was happy to throw his most loyal henchman to the wolves.

In front of the huge crowd outside the White House he called on Pence to do the unthinkable — unilaterally overturn the democratic will of the people. Pence, to his credit, refused to do so, only to be attacked by Trump afterwards for lacking courage.

How does Trump think he will maintain sway over Republicans or run for president in 2024 when he has betrayed many of his most loyal supporters, including the party’s leadership group? Does he think Americans will just forget the sight of their beloved Capitol building being stormed by Trump disciples? And now every congressional Republican has lived through the frightening experience of having an angry mob rampaging through the halls of congress after being incited by a Republican president.

The Republican Party has traded away all it once stood for — from balanced budgets, to free trade and immigration — to accommodate Trump and his populist brand of politics. Only a small cabal of Republicans, driven by fear and ambition, is still backing Trump’s claims of electoral fraud by taking the undemocratic step of challenging Biden’s win in congress. History will not treat them kindly, nor will it treat Trump kindly for his role in what unfolded in Washington on Thursday.

If Trump wants to return to the world of real estate and forget politics after Biden becomes president on January 20, he may not care much about the turmoil he has created. But if Trump wants to remain a Republican kingmaker — or one day return to the White House — he has done himself enormous harm by being so cavalier and disrespectful to America’s democracy.