GOP reputation as the party of law and order collapsing under the weight of Trump's 'anarchy and lawlessness': analyst

In an interview with The Guardian's David Smith, Larry Jacobs who heads up the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota, claimed that the Republican Party's attempts to play the law and order card in the upcoming election is falling flat with voters who are inundated with new revelations of Donald Trump's criminality on a daily basis.

As the report notes, every two years Republicans use their reputation as being tougher on crimes as one key planks of their platform, but Trump -- and the violent Jan. 6 insurrection he inspired -- is creating roadblocks to making it an effective election year tool.

As Smith wrote, "Republicans’ own claim to be the party of law and order is this time undermined, critics say, by the behavior of its party leaders. Former president Donald Trump, who is under myriad criminal, civil and congressional investigations, is not alone. Many senior Republicans have rallied to his defense or displayed their own contempt for the rule of law."

According to analyst Jacobs, “The Republican party is quickly becoming a party of anarchy and lawlessness."

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Explaining, "This is supposed to be the party of conservative principles, of tradition, of respect for customs and rules that make society governable," Jacobs continued, "The idea that the law does not apply to Republicans is something that has now become part of the mainstream of the Republican party. We see it in terms of the approach to elections. We see it in terms of the treatment of immigrants. Some of the actions with regard to abortion may approach that level. The Republican party appears to consider the law and the constitution to be optional and to have lost legitimacy.”

As Smith writes, in just the last two months Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort has been the subject of a search by FBI agents who retrieved stolen government documents that could lead to indictments tied to the Espionage act or charges of obstruction. Add to that, New York Attorney General Letitia James has filed a $250 million lawsuit against the former president and his three eldest children, Don Jr., Ivanka and Eric, for alleged real estate fraud.

According to conservative campaign consultant Tara Setmayer, who has become a highly vocal Trump critic, the GOP has a 'hypocrisy" problem.

“The rank hypocrisy of the Republican party trying to use these issues under the auspices of law and order when they continue to support a professional scofflaw in Donald Trump is laughable," she explained. "Republicans have turned a blind eye to Trump’s behavior before, during and after his presidency, which is giving a permission structure to other Republican presidential hopefuls like Ron DeSantis to act in potentially extrajudicial ways to accomplish their agenda of fearmongering and ‘owning the libs.'”

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Setmayer added, "These are the same Republicans who ran around with their hair on fire, concerned with what President Obama was doing through executive orders on guns and on immigration. That was nowhere near as legally dubious as what Republicans are doing today.”