These far-right intellectuals saw Trump's presidency as a 'trial balloon' -- and have much worse things planned

The New Republic has published a lengthy report about a group of far-right intellectuals who have now made undermining American democracy their primary goal -- with or without the help of former President Donald Trump.

As explained by author Laura Field, who currently serves as a senior fellow at the Niskanen Center, many of these pro-Trump intellectuals have been congregating at the Claremont Institute, where they push out polemical screeds that compare their political opponents to "zombies and human rodents."

One of the most notorious Claremont alums is John Eastman, the pro-Trump lawyer who wrote the infamous six-point plan to have Vice President Mike Pence reject certifying the results of the 2020 election.

Another Claremont fellow is Michael Anton, who wrote an essay called "The Flight 93 Election" in 2016 in which he said conservatives had to vote for Trump the same way passengers on Flight 93 had to charge against al-Qaeda hijackers lest they face the certain doom of a Hillary Clinton presidency.

And even though Trump is no longer in the White House, writes Field, these intellectuals think he has opened up doors for them that didn't exist before his presidency.

"These intellectuals have taken up Trump's illiberal baton with gusto," she writes. "For them, Trump was a trial balloon for what they hope will be an altogether more serious and deliberate political project."

Read the whole piece here.