Highlights: As Republican hardliners tossed Speaker Kevin McCarthy out of office and attempted to dictate his replacement, one word kept recurring in their complaints about existing GOP leaders: “uniparty.”
The term crystallizes an idea widespread on the MAGA right: that too many Republican politicians and especially leaders are, on key issues, aligned with Democrats and the Washington establishment, and working against Donald Trump and the right.
“Right now, we are governed by a uniparty that Speaker McCarthy has fused with Joe Biden and Hakeem Jeffries,” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) said last month.
One key outside ally for Gaetz was Steve Bannon, the former Trump aide and now commentator. Bannon frequently deploys the “uniparty” epithet, as he’d done for years. He’s long tried to purge the GOP of its more conventional members, replacing them with hardliners who will more loyally back Trump and far-right causes.
In many ways, the idea that Kevin McCarthy was indistinguishable from a Democrat seems self-evidently absurd.