Friend, 

I’m not really one for new years resolutions, and this late into January I’m not going to pretend I have one. But here’s what I told myself at the beginning of January 2023.

This year, The Lincoln Project won’t be cowed by the conventional wisdom – we won’t be caught sleeping like so many have been in the past. Trump is not going away without a fight, and anyone who believes that is caught in a trap of wishful thinking.

We’re not going to let the media or the daily drama on Twitter distract from that ultimate message. We’re going to use our unique perspective as bare-knuckle campaigners who have seen both sides of these fights – from Presidential primaries to State House races – to sound the alarm for democracy.

Case and point: Kevin McCarthy. This SINO (Speaker In Name Only) has sold his spine to Marjorie Taylor Greene, his larynx to Matt Gaetz, and the scattered remains of his soul to the hungry ultra-MAGA masses. 

He’s an empty vessel filled with the most extreme elements of the Republican Party and Trump is controlling the entire operation. 

Want more proof? Look at the committee assignments. It’s all hard Trump allies and “Stop the Steal insurrectionists” The investigatory select committees are aimed at Trump’s personal list of grievances. And Trump’s biggest Democratic antagonists are getting locked out of their former assignments. 

This isn’t a party stuck in an internal debate between its moderate and radical wings. It’s all MAGA all the time.

Of course, it’s a mess of competing factions. We saw it during McCarthy’s speaker vote and we’re seeing it again during this race for the chair of the RNC.

But that’s just a war between generic ultra-MAGA and its most belligerent members. They’re all firmly under Donald Trump’s finger. And when the GOP base gives Trump a resounding and early primary victory (check recent polling for more proof there), the GOP will return to being lockstep with the former guy. 

We’re not fooled. Don’t be fooled either, Friend. He’s still the man in charge. He’s still the puppet master. And as always, it’s up to us to stop him. 

-Reed