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Analysis: Obama and Trump intensify their battle over democracy
Jun 08, 2021 2 mins, 57 secs
But the 44th and 45th Presidents just renewed their battle over the country's political lifeblood -- democracy -- which has rarely faced a graver assault than from Trump's election fraud lies.

No two individuals better exemplify the current chasm between the two halves of the country: one racially diverse and socially liberal, the other mostly White and conservative.

The former President warned the Republican Party that sought to neuter his presidency had taken a much darker turn as many of its key lawmakers now support Trump's falsehoods about non-existent electoral fraud and whitewash his role in inciting an insurrection against Congress on January 6.

"We have to worry," Obama said, "when one of our major political parties is willing to embrace a way of thinking about our democracy that would be unrecognizable and unacceptable even five years ago or a decade ago."

That was some statement from a former President whose own administration was blocked at almost every turn by the GOP, and who once hoped in vain that the conservative "fever would break" with his reelection in 2012.

The interview with Obama aired just two days after Trump unveiled his most flagrant manifestation yet of the Big Lie of a stolen election, as he took his first steps on a comeback trail with a demagogic appearance in North Carolina.

"I'm not the one trying to undermine American democracy.

I'm the one that's trying to save it," Trump said, spinning a new and pernicious reality in which his millions of supporters can take refuge from the truth of the events of 2020.

Multiple courts, election officials in key states and official audits established that Trump lost fair and square to Biden last November, as the ex-President's spurious suits alleging fraud fell apart.

And it becomes that much more difficult for us to hear each other, see each other," Obama told Cooper.

It is clear that bitter experience and what would once have been seen as unthinkable political turmoil in modern America have scorched the worldview of the man who as a youthful Illinois Senate candidate wowed the nation with his career-making assurance that there is not a "liberal America and a conservative America" or a "Black America, a White America" but "there is the United States of America."

'It can happen here'

Trump has never subscribed to the ideal of unity Obama invoked at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston.

Ted Budd -- who voted not to certify Biden's election win -- Trump made clear the price for his support in a party he still dominates is full fealty to his election fraud lies -- and that endorsement only came after his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, decided against running.

He later tried to deny he said what he said, even though it was on tape.

A rare Republican with the courage to stand up to Trump, Rep.

Liz Cheney of Wyoming, was stripped of her third-ranking GOP leadership post in the House.

In an appearance on David Axelrod's "Axe Files" podcast, Cheney said on Saturday that Trump's incitement of the Capitol insurrection was the "most dangerous thing, the most egregious violation of an oath of office of any president in our history."

Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of the autocratic transformation of the Republican Party, which once styled itself as the guardian of global democracy, is that it profits from and advances a parallel attack by Washington's former Cold War foe Russia.

As well as the election interference to benefit Trump, US intelligence agencies blame Russia for a flurry of cyberattacks on US government facilities and companies.

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