In the wake of Democrats’ surprisingly impressive performance in the 2022 midterms, it might be easy for some of us to forget just how starkly divided this nation actually remains, even as we continue to be supplied with reminders on a near daily basis. Just this week, for example, after we watched as President Biden masterfully took Republicans to task for threatening Social Security and Medicare, many of us reflexively ignored the Fox News-laden gibberish spouted by former Trump press secretary (and now Arkansas Gov.) Sarah Huckabee Sanders in response. After all, her diatribe was aimed at an entirely separate audience, obviously not directed toward Democrats, and not even (as New York Times columnist Paul Krugman points out) toward Americans as a whole. But while Sanders’ litany of grievances may have seemed incomprehensible to us, to millions of Republican viewers it made perfect sense.
Likewise, while for Democrats the performative antics of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and other Republicans during the State of the Union were simply crass and embarrassing, many GOP voters doubtlessly found her catcalling to be brave and even inspiring. Because such crude, performative behavior is now common practice from Republicans wed to “owning the libs” as a means of fundraising, we’ve now almost grown inured to it.
On a more “macro” level, though, red states and blue states continue to diverge relentlessly in their entire outlooks. Missouri’s state legislature overwhelmingly approves legislation permitting children to carry guns in public places, while Texas and Florida continue to devolve into semi-fascism, touting an “anti-woke” agenda that singles out and targets vulnerable groups such as pregnant and transgender persons. Meanwhile, “blue” states enact provisions protecting these same groups from hate and discrimination. Nearly all of these profound disparities between states can be traced to the conflict between longstanding, pervasive racism and white Christian nationalism (prevalent in “red” states) versus more secular and tolerant views (dominant in “blue” ones). In that respect, they are simply the most recent manifestations of forces that have riven this country for decades, if not centuries. But the fact that they now signify deep divisions in everything from tax policy, to the provision of health care, to enforcement of labor and environmental regulations, suggests that they are more or less permanent fixtures, even as our politics continue to idealize a fantasy of national unity.
So the nation continues to be deeply and possibly irrevocably divided, while the current Supreme Court—now dominated by radical, conservative reactionaries—stokes that division even further through its ideological rulings, much as it did with its infamous Dred Scott decision that helped to facilitate the Civil War. Except the court has now confirmed its intent to go even further, targeting personal autonomy and our very structure of government in an unprecedented effort to turn back the clock and reverse the social advances of the 20th century. Given the seemingly implacable divisions that already exist in this country, it’s not particularly apocalyptic anymore to imagine a point where the majority populations in “blue” states simply refuse to bow to this court’s edicts and opt to go it alone.
The prospect of secession from the so-called “tyranny” of a federal government perceived to be a threat to their cultural identity has long been a staple of right-wing fever dreams. However, the election of Donald Trump, his validation of the racist sensibilities and vitriol toward liberalism, and the concomitant, eager participation of right-wing media in stoking the country’s divisions, have given the issue new prominence, particularly with Republicans. But the advent of a radical and heedless Supreme Court majority bent on destroying social and political norms previously accepted in this country as immutable has suddenly made the idea of separation more palatable to the left, as well. The increasing acceptance by the political right of (and exhortation to) violence as a means of settling political differences has also raised the country’s temperature level to a point where the Second Amendment has transformed itself from a symbol of liberty into a threat, wielded and espoused by right-wing so-called “militia” groups who have embraced the idea domestic terrorism in order to have their way with the rest of us.
Steven Simon, formerly the senior director for counterterrorism in the Clinton administration (now a fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology) and Jonathan Stevenson, senior fellow at the British-based International Institute for Strategic Studies and former National Security Council (NSC) staffer during the Obama administration, explain how the threat of right-wing violence has now become the undercurrent of all American politics. In an essay titled “These Disunited States” appearing last September in the New York Review of Books, they write:
A far-right effort is underway to introduce violent intimidation into conventional politics, not unlike the fascist campaign to undermine the Weimar Republic a century ago. According to the FBI, most domestic terrorist attacks are carried out by antigovernment and white supremacist militants on the right. Their leaders may judge their target rather soft. The unpreparedness of the authorities as the January 6 insurrection unfolded can only encourage them. But even under Biden, federal agencies have hesitated to undertake major enforcement action against militias for fear of situations like those that occurred at Waco and Ruby Ridge in the early 1990s; they now appear afraid that one stray bullet could ignite escalating violence. Similar thinking may inform Attorney General Merrick Garland’s apparent reluctance to indict Trump and those in his inner circle over January 6. The incitements and threats of violence provoked by the FBI’s recent execution of a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Florida residence, are liable to reinforce these worries. Local elected law enforcement officials in Republican-controlled jurisdictions, for their part, are inclined to refrain from prosecuting those in their increasingly radicalized “base.”
That radicalization, fueled by election denial and what Simon and Stevenson identify as the “conflation” between the Republican Party and Christianity, has led to what they characterize as an “absolutism” emanating from the GOP, in which “the breadth and depth of the present threat to the country seems unprecedented in post–Civil War America.” From a historical perspective, they note that Reconstruction in the aftermath of the Civil War, intended to peacefully reincorporate the rebellious South into the nation, allowed such separatist sentiments to foster for decades, as the mythical “Lost Cause.” They contend that this attitude has now morphed into (yet another) myth: that of a “predominantly white, Christian America that other races and cultures have compromised and that is bound to perish unless prompt and decisive action is taken; that is the fundamental if unspoken meaning of Trump’s “Make America Great Again.”
And as a consequence of this pervasive, right-wing dogma:
America is already virtually a binational state, with two sharply opposed national communities comparable in size and political strength that effectively operate as confederations under a single federal government. The Republican Party is mostly white and marginally increasing its Latino membership, the Democratic Party an ethnic and racial mix. Although Democrats occasionally reveal impulses toward reconciliation, Republicans largely do not.
The country’s two parties now view each other with a “mutual loathing,” as Simon and Stevenson describe it, one that is reinforced by population distribution in urban and rural areas of the country, and one that now appears effectively “irreconcilable.” This division is being demonstrated again and again in legislation passed in red vs. blue states, reflecting a political polarization in which “Each party thinks that the other poses a mortal threat to the future of the country” (The authors note, however, that these sentiments are far more dominant among Republicans). Those attitudes are stoked by the underlying, continuous threat of political violence and the increasing willingness of the GOP at all levels to challenge lawful elections through intimidation tactics.
Against this backdrop, the authors see the 2024 election as a potentially critical “turning point.” If a Republican president is elected—be it Trump, DeSantis or anyone else—and Congress remains controlled in whole or in part by Democrats, they predict near complete paralysis of governmental functions, potentially aggravated by that president’s deployment of federal agents to thwart protests against the radical policy changes that would be implemented (they note that Donald Trump has already indicated his intention to weaponize the federal government against Democrats should he be reelected, and there’s little reason to believe a DeSantis administration would do anything less). At that point, they suggest that individual states would begin to develop their own policies and. serious discussions about potential separation from the federal government would begin at the state level as “individual states would probably see significant advantages to joining with others that share their political leanings,” with one consideration being outright secession by blue states (or, in the case of an elected Democratic president, by red states). We saw the beginnings of this trend when states began to collaborate in response to Trump’s disastrous mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Such talk of “secession” (in this example, “amicable separation” is more apt) is invariably dismissed as being impractical given the intermingling of Republican and Democratic populations in even the most politically polarized states (particularly when taking into account the urban/rural divide), and the authors admit that such a prospect would be infinitely more difficult and complex than the secession of Confederacy that caused the Civil War: “There would likely be substantial internal migration and displacement before, during, and after the creation of the new entities, while many others made their peace with the new dispensation and stayed put.” Further, they suggest certain states might initially opt for what they characterize as a slower, de facto secession of certain states that could become de jure secession as they were joined by like-minded citizens of other states, agitating for separation. Still others would advocate for a more muscular, coordinated, national suppression of dissent by whichever party controlled the Executive branch. In any circumstance, in the early stages “Internecine unrest—including street violence, assassinations of prominent figures, kidnappings and bombings—might arise and insidiously intensify.” The authors acknowledge that these sectarian schisms would, in turn, influence law enforcement and the judicial process at nearly every level and, if that point is reached, outright violence would become commonplace, particularly from the right.
Faced with those dismal prospects but recognizing the reality that the divisions in this country are probably unbridgeable, Simon and Stevenson propose a series of measures that would potentially forestall an outright Second Civil War. They suggest one solution (and there aren’t many to be had) could be a “purposeful de-Federalization” in which certain aspects of federal authority are transferred to the states.
The authors write:
In a more deliberate, orderly process, there are two broad structural possibilities. One would be a partial defederalization, in which a national legislature would pass laws relating to the funding and maintenance of the armed forces and other national assets, mainly infrastructure, and otherwise leave the states to govern themselves. This would bear a passing resemblance to the EU. The other would entail complete separation into two successor states, each of which would federate internally to the degree necessary.
They acknowledge that most Democrats, in particular, continue to view the federal government as the most practical vehicle for redressing injustice and protecting racial minorities and vulnerable populations from discrimination and abuse. However, a government thoroughly weaponized and in thrall to right-wing grievances and policies—which Donald Trump has promised, and Ron DeSantis would certainly pursue—would hardly be recognizable to most of us. Rather, it would become a vehicle to enforce oppression. Further, the authors suggest that from an economic standpoint the residents of blue states “might welcome more systematic separation from red states,” simply to divest themselves from the “parasitic” role that red states now enjoy from federal appropriations. On the other hand, red states would want to preserve the status quo, while favoring the imposition of more repressive measures to “tamp down dissent,” as the authors put it.
They acknowledge that this dramatic process, if it could be achieved peacefully, would require referenda in all 50 states and certainly a new Constitutional convention. Further, the role of the military would have to be reimagined in light of such drastic changes in order to provide for the common defense of such a divided country. That in and of itself would require a remarkable degree of cooperation among hostile states, but the authors convincingly suggest that it is not inconceivable. As the authors note, even more daunting challenges of such “defederalization” would be how to allocate resources for such programs as Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid (for those states that elect to continue these programs). Other more practical but equally serious concerns include the distribution of energy, the maintenance of transportation infrastructure, and the resettling of “political migrants.”
All of this admittedly may sound like the stuff of science fiction, but the country that Republicans—with a complicit Supreme Court—seem prepared to foist on us should they ever again attain Executive power is simply not going to be a place that millions of us will want to live in. Just two years ago, the prospect of half the nation controlling women’s and pregnant people’s reproductive decisions seemed dystopian as well. The Biden administration has allowed us a temporary respite from the fascist dream that Republicans are now salivating for, but the GOP shows no real signs of letting up: In fact, in places like Florida and Texas, they’re already doubling down. And while we can (and will) work hard in hopes that they never win another presidential election, they’ve shown us exactly what they intend if they do.
Such a drastic split among the states is extremely unpleasant to think about, to put it mildly. But Simon and Stevenson are hardly unserious people. Their point is that it’s probably better to think the unthinkable now, rather than being forced to after it’s already too late.
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