On January 6, there was an attack on the United States Capitol by a violent mob of supporters of President Donald Trump. The attack took place to disrupt a joint session of the Congress that was conducting an Electoral College vote count to formalise the election victory of President-elect Joe Biden. It was an unprecedented event in the history of America as the American people and the entire world saw live-proceedings of the Capitol, considered the biggest temple of democracy, being desecrated and ravaged by marauding mobs that ran amok in the corridors of the Capitol with little resistance from the police or armed forces. The attack led to the evacuation and lockdown of the building and resulted in 5 deaths.
The immediate trigger for the siege of Capitol Hill was the rally on January 5 and 6 by supporters of President Trump, in which highly inciting and incendiary speeches were made to provoke the crowds to storm the Capitol and pressurise Congress and Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the election of former vice president Joe Biden. However, as investigations reveal, the entire episode could not have taken place without some serious and meticulous planning. The rabble-rousing speeches by the top leadership of the Republican party of the USA at that “Save America” rally will always be a shameful stigma for the Republicans and the entire siege marks a watershed in American politics. Sample this. The words of Donald Trump – “fight like hell” and “take back our country”. Rudy Giuliani – “trial by combat”. Trump Jr – “we’re coming for you”.
As new footage and investigations reveal, the mob assaulted police officers and reporters, set up gallows on the Capitol grounds and wanted to take some lawmakers hostage. There were cries of “hang Mike Pence”. Many among those identified later were on the FBI Terrorist Screening Database under the classification of “white supremacists”. So how did things deteriorate to such a level? Who is to be blamed for this? How could the greatest democracy on earth be sabotaged so easily and its “holiest shrine” violated in a matter of a few hours? Where were the armed forces and police? More importantly, what will be the implications of this event on America and the world? Does the entire turn of events have any resemblances with the situation in India?
THE ROOTS OF THE PROBLEM
America is the bastion of capitalism. It has always advocated the triumvirate of privatisation, liberalisation and globalisation. After the financial meltdown of 2008 and the start of the Obama presidency, there was a burst of economic activity following various stimulus packages and the arrival of easy money due to the Federal Reserve’s monetary policies.
The time also marked the rise of China as the manufacturing hub of the world and countries like India becoming the destination of choice for outsourcing work related to IT and the service industry. This definitely had a detrimental effect on the factories and those employed in the service sector in the United States as companies shifted their production to China and outsourced their processes to India in a bid to reduce costs and boost profits.
Those most affected (lost jobs or had to find lower-paying jobs) belonged to states known as the Mid-West or the “red states” which have traditionally voted for the Republican Party. This situation was exploited to the hilt by the Trump team as he fought and defeated Hilary Clinton in the 2016 presidential elections. The victory of Trump gave a new ascendancy and power to that segment of the Republican Party who were white, anti-immigration, pro-life, devout Christians (and somehow afraid of the rise of Islam and Muslims in America), anti-China and believed strongly in the rhetoric of “might is right”.
The Trump campaign slogan of “Let’s Make America Great Again” struck a chord among his voters and marked the beginning of the rise of “Trumpism”. In an Oped piece in the New York Times (Dec 22, 2020), Mathew Continetti of the American Enterprise Institute wrote – “The Trump program is subject to change at the whim of the Trump persona. The party more often catered to the president’s obsessions, tastes, moods and inclinations than it stood against them. Even as it became clear that what really thrilled the crowds at MAGA rallies was Mr. Trump’s unpredictability, brashness, crudity, dark comedy and unapologetic fighting spirit, some on the right began an effort to backfill ideological content into the vessel of “Trumpism.”
“What they forgot was that for Mr. Trump, everything is a transaction. Deals can be modified until the last moment and then litigated after the contract has been signed. It’s true that the broad outlines of Mr. Trump’s worldview – immigration restriction, trade protection, reluctance to enter into foreign entanglements, opposition to entitlement reform – have been more or less consistent for decades. What is equally true is that Mr. Trump has no hesitation in dropping a proposal, person or principle if he believes it will suit him. The programmatic details of Trumpism are fungible. The attitude behind it is not.”
Thus as it became more and more clear from the results of the recent 2020 elections that the American voters had voted in favour of Joe Biden and the Democratic Party, Donald Trump instead of conceding defeat refused to accept the election results and called it an election fraud. He did all that he could to block a peaceful transition of power and refused to relinquish office. The final showdown was the assault on Capitol Hill, resulting in another impeachment of Trump, the first President to be impeached twice in American history. This episode definitely marks the political decline of Trump but his legacy of hate and polarisation that he has managed to heap on American society will always be his dark abiding legacy.
PARALLELS WITH INDIA
We all know the much-touted bonhomie between President Trump and Prime Minister Modi. The ‘Howdy Modi’ event in Houston Texas and the “Namaste Trump” jamboree at Ahmedabad showcased the common taste of both leaders for spectacle over substance and a style of governance that dazzles more than it delivers. This similarity was best summarised by TM Krishna in The Wire (7 June, 2016) – “An identical target audience, an obvious majoritarian bend, fear-mongering a common tool, copybook tokenism towards minorities overflowing with condescension, an intentional jingoistic national fervour, and the result: A Gemini-like twosome, political twins blowing identical horns. I speak of two very different personalities – Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the US Republican presidential aspirant Donald Trump”.
There was a deluge on social media of images placed side by side that showed the storming of Capitol Hill and frantic kar sevaks demolishing the Babri Masjid. While the dreadful events in Washington DC exposed the ‘white-privilege’ prevalent in America as many analysts and people on social media comment on how the story would have unfolded if the protestors were black or Muslims, it also brought home the reality of America versus America. A country that was the fortress of democracy has crumbled to mobocracy and it has been polarised to a degree where one camp sees their political adversaries as anti-national and traitors deserving the death penalty. India has an uneven and somewhat jagged record when it comes to practising pluralism and inclusivity, upholding communal harmony and respect for the rule of law. Unfortunately, the decline of centrist and secular parties due to the dilution in their practice of their core ideology and principles for the sake of political expediency along with the rise of the right-wing forces has seen the resurgence of communal polarisation and unprecedented Islamophobia. As the United States slides into becoming an illiberal democracy, India will do well to learn its lessons from this painful affair. Ignoring them is bound to have dreadful consequences.