WHERE'S JANET RENO WHEN WE NEED HER?:

One year after Donald Trump's supporters stormed the Capitol in Washington D.C., the hard right, anti-democracy faction of the Republican base that led the attack threatens to overtake the party for the long term.

This hard-right faction, loyal to former President Trump, minimizes, or supports, the violent storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6. They have worked to systemically undermine America's democracy in the months following the attack by installing into positions of power loyal proponents of Trump's Big Lie and by passing a flurry of voter suppression bills. The few Republicans who oppose Trump or acknowledge the wrong that he and others did on Jan. 6 face being ostracized.

This group of Republicans also embrace lies and conspiracy theories to spin away what happened that day. Repeatedly, such high-profile Trump backers as Tucker Carlson have opted to further stoke the feelings of paranoia and bitterness that undergirded the attack, rather than work to calm the tensions of a nation in turmoil.

"What happened today will be used by the people taking power to justify stripping you of the rights you were born with as an American," Carlson told his audience of over 4 million people on the night Trump supporters attacked the Capitol. "Your right to speak without being censored, your right to assemble, to not be spied upon, to make a living, to defend your family, most critically."

The tenor of rhetoric like this and the infusion of once fringe, white supremacist ideas into mainstream discourse has raised alarm within Southern Poverty Law Center, and all who care about democracy. Couple those trends with the rapid introduction of aggressive, anti-democracy actions from Republicans who ally themselves with Trump, and the magnitude of the potential crisis we face as a country becomes apparent. The following analysis details how the hard right has assembled in the aftermath of Trump's last days in office, systematically building a culture where violence and authoritarianism can further take root in the U.S.

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