Republican senators joined Religious Right activists at the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s annual Road to Majority conference in Washington, D.C., today, where they warned that if Democrats are successful in obtaining a supermajority in the 2020 elections, socialism will be implemented in America.
Hysterical warnings about creeping socialism have been a routine staple in conservative messaging for decades. Republicans regularly labeled President Obama a socialist during his time in office, despite no indication that the label was accurate. During this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), speakers renewed their devotion to plastering the socialist label on politicians and policies they oppose, and expressed their continued commitment to the scaremongering as the race to 2020 begins.
RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel told MSNBC yesterday, before the first round of Democratic debates, that she wasn’t sure if there was a single Democrat pursuing the presidency that she would not consider a socialist. Currently, the only Democrat seeking the 2020 nomination for president who has labeled himself a socialist is Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
At Road to Majority, the GOP’s strategy met face-to-face with the Religious Right. As plates of chicken and salad were served at the opening session, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas addressed the group, and he warned that “the fate of the nation is being debated.” Cruz asked the audience if they had watched last night’s Democratic Party debate between candidates for president and asked those in attendence to memorize a mantra: “defend freedom.” He criticized Democrats for proposing higher tax rates for wealthy Americans and universal access to health care.
“We saw, last night, an embrace of socialism,” Cruz said. He went on to praise Alliance Defending Freedom, a powerful conservative legal group founded in the 1990s that has argued in favor of anti-LGBTQ discrimination practices in the name of “religious liberty.”
