With 2017 in the rearview mirror, we can now conclude that Trump and the GOP have been targeting conservatives for elimination since the 2016 election because of the threat we pose to their positions of power and the advance of Trumplicanism.
With increasing frequency, Mitch McConnell has worked to destroy conservatives while propping up his RINO establishment buddies. Meanwhile, Trump has worked to destroy conservatives he feels aren’t “loyal” to his brand of New York Liberal politics. In the GOP war against conservatism, there’s been a lot of collateral damage as so-called conservatives display their cowardice when faced with defending our ideals against Trump’s nationalist/populist assaults.
As if being a coward isn’t bad enough, many of these invertebrate conservatives have willingly allowed themselves to be assimilated by the Trumplican Borg, making differences between the two indistinguishable. From members of the media like Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity, and Steve Bannon at Breitbart News to the House Freedom Caucus, Trumplicanism has succeeded in rebranding conservatism.
And much like a virus, Trumplicanism is spreading to infect even the most “strident” conservative organizations.
For years, the Heritage Foundation has been a reliable voice for the conservative cause; this was particularly true when Jim DeMint left Congress in 2013 to be the president and CEO of the organization. However, when DeMint led the organization in opposing non-conservative policies like the fake-repeal of Obamacare and excessive spending, he was forced to resign under questionable circumstances, along with about 30 others who supported him. DeMint was temporarily replaced by Heritage Founder Ed Feulner who had been serving on Trump’s transition team prior to taking the assignment.
It was rumored at the time that DeMint’s termination was the culmination of a take-over effort by Mike Needham, the CEO of Heritage Action—the activist arm of the Heritage Foundation. This rumor intensified when it became known that Needham’s friend and the former advisor to Donald Trump, Steve Bannon, was being considered to replace DeMint.
However, under pressure from higher-ups within Heritage, Needham backed off on the Bannon effort. Still, the Trump connection to Heritage remained intact as we witnessed by yesterday’s announcement from the organization.
After 8 months of “searching” for DeMint’s replacement, the head of the search committee, Kay Coles James, has been “selected” for the job. Besides the convenience of overseeing the committee that recommended her, James was an early supporter of Donald Trump, and she served on his transition team just as Feulner did.
As a businessman, Trump knows what a hostile takeover looks like and he’s successfully conducted one on the formerly conservative Heritage Foundation.
David Leach is the owner of The Strident Conservative, your source for opinion that’s politically-incorrect and always “right.” His columns are featured on RedState.com, NOQReport.com, and TheResurgent.com.
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