NEWS ANALYSIS

‘Nobody Is in Charge’: A Ragged G.O.P. Stumbles Through the Wilderness

With no unified agenda or clear leadership, Republicans face the prospect that the anti-establishment fervor that has powered the party in recent years could now devour it.

By Lisa Lerer and Reid J. Epstein

Jan. 5, 2023, 5:00 a.m. ET

After two days of chaos and confusion on the House floor, Republicans have made it abundantly clear who is leading their party: absolutely no one.

From the halls of Congress to the Ohio Statehouse to the back-room dealings of the Republican National Committee, the party is confronting an identity crisis unseen in decades. With no unified legislative agenda, clear leadership or shared vision for the country, Republicans find themselves mired in intraparty warfare, defined by a fringe element that seems more eager to tear down the House than to rebuild the foundation of a political party that has faced disappointment in the past three national elections.

Even as Donald J. Trump rarely leaves his Florida home in what so far appears to be little more than a Potemkin presidential campaign, Republicans have failed to quell the anti-establishment fervor that accompanied his rise to power. Instead, those tumultuous political forces now threaten to devour the entire party.

Nowhere was that on more vivid display than the House floor, where 20 Republicans on Wednesday stymied their party from taking control for a second day by refusing to support Representative Kevin McCarthy’s bid for speaker.

The uncertainty continued into the evening on Wednesday. After Mr. McCarthy failed on his sixth attempt to win the leadership position, the House — by a two-vote margin — agreed to adjourn until noon Thursday, a result greeted by hoots and hollers by Democrats hoping to extend his misery late into the night.

“Nobody is in charge,” John Fredericks, a syndicated right-wing radio host and former chairman of Mr. Trump’s 2016 and 2020 campaigns in Virginia, said in an interview. “Embrace the chaos. Our movement is embracing the chaos.”

That ideology of destruction defies characterization by traditional political labels like moderate or conservative. Instead, the party has created its own complicated taxonomy of America First, MAGA and anti-Trump — descriptions that are more about political style and personal vendettas than policy disagreements.

This iteration of the Grand Old Party, with its narrow majority in the House empowering conservative dissidents, represents a striking reversal of the classic political maxim that Democrats need to fall in love while Republicans just fall in line.

“The members who began this have little interest in legislating, but are most interested in burning down the existing Republican leadership structure,” said Karl Rove, the Republican strategist who embodies the party’s pre-Trump era. “Their behavior shows the absence of power corrupts just as absolutely as power does.”

Mr. Fredericks, who is typically one of the most aggressive pro-Trump voices in the conservative news media, said that even the former president’s renewed endorsement of Mr. McCarthy on Wednesday would do little to shore up the would-be speaker’s support.

A New Congress Begins

The 118th Congress opened on Jan. 3, with Republicans taking control of the House and Democrats holding the Senate.

• A Divided House: House Republicans began their new majority rule by failing to elect a speaker. The infighting has exposed a big rift in the party.

• George Santos: The new congressman from New York, a Republican who has made false claims about his background, education and finances, brings his saga to Capitol Hill.

• Pelosi Era Ends: Nancy Pelosi, the first woman to become House speaker, leaves a legacy that will be difficult for the new leadership of both parties to reach.

• Elise Stefanik: The New York congresswoman’s climb to MAGA stardom is a case study in the collapse of the old Republican establishment, but her rise may also be a cautionary tale.

Indeed, none of Mr. McCarthy’s opponents reversed course after receiving calls from Mr. Trump encouraging them to do so. Rather, Representative Lauren Boebert of Colorado took to the floor to urge her “favorite president” to change his view and tell Mr. McCarthy to withdraw his bid.

“The movement has eclipsed its Trump leadership,” Mr. Fredericks said on Wednesday. “We found 20 new leaders.”

That’s a very different definition of a leader from the traditional image of a legislator muscling policy through Congress and reshaping American life. In the new conservative ecosystem, leaders are born of the outrage that drives news coverage on the right and fuels online fund-raising.

The new political dynamics distinguish this class of Republican agitators from the self-styled revolutionaries who took control under former Speaker Newt Gingrich in 1994 or the Tea Party lawmakers who clashed with Speaker John Boehner after the party’s 2010 triumph. Those insurgent movements aspired to change the vision of the party. This group of House lawmakers, their Republican critics say, are focused far more on their personal power.

“There’s been a growing tolerance of people who do not act in good faith who consistently diminish the institution for their personal gain and advancement,” said former Representative Carlos Curbelo, a Florida Republican who was in the House for the first two years of the Trump administration. “This is the most dramatic manifestation of that toxic culture.”

While few voters are likely to be following every twist in the arcane congressional procedure, several Republicans acknowledged that the party’s infighting in the House could saddle it with an enduring perception of dysfunction.

Matt Brooks, the executive director of the powerful Republican Jewish Coalition, called for the “infidels” to pay a “real price” for their opposition, adding, “There are elements of us looking like the Keystone Kops.”

At least a few Republicans worried that the drama could have long-term effects, as the party heads into what increasingly looks like a contentious battle for the 2024 presidential nomination.

“We have to get this speakership settled and we have to go forward if we want to be successful in 2024 as a united party,” Ronna McDaniel, who faces a stiff challenge this month to her leadership of the Republican National Committee, said on Fox News on Tuesday. Pleading for lawmakers to unify behind Mr. McCarthy, she said, “This Republican-on-Republican infighting is only hurting one thing: our party.”

The uproar on the House floor even prompted some Republicans to praise a Democrat who has for years been one of their most reviled figures.

“Nancy Pelosi is the most effective speaker this country has ever had,” said former Representative Billy Long of Missouri, who claims to have coined the phrase “Trump Train” in 2015. “She never missed. She would get her people. She’d get the votes by hook or by crook.”

For their part, Democrats largely declined to comment on the spectacle. They didn’t need to: The images from President Biden’s appearance on Wednesday in Kentucky — where he shook hands with Senator Mitch McConnell in front of a bridge project funded by their bipartisan legislation — cut a sharp contrast with the arguments and pained glances on the House floor.

“It’s a little embarrassing it’s taking so long, and the way they are dealing with one another,” Mr. Biden said of House Republicans on Wednesday as he left the White House. “What I am focused on is getting things done.”

The Republican unrest has trickled down to places like the Ohio Statehouse, where State Representative Jason Stephens, a moderate Republican, joined with Democrats this week to snatch the speakership from State Representative Derek Merrin, who has co-sponsored some of the chamber’s most conservative legislation. The surprising outcome reflected the Republican caucus’s inability to unify behind a single candidate despite holding a two-thirds majority.

The Republican National Committee is also facing questions over Ms. McDaniel’s leadership. Like Mr. McCarthy, she predicted sweeping victories before the November election, and she is now being challenged by Harmeet Dhillon of California, an R.N.C. member who has argued that there must be consequences for the party’s failure to meet expectations.

Both Republican conflicts have split the conservative news media, with Tucker Carlson of Fox News backing the insurgencies while his prime-time colleagues have urged Republicans to coalesce behind Mr. McCarthy.

As in the House, the R.N.C. fight isn’t about conservative bona fides or fund-raising prowess or even fealty to Mr. Trump. Ms. Dhillon’s case against Ms. McDaniel is that the party didn’t perform strongly enough in November — and that if more Republicans had won in competitive House races, Mr. McCarthy would not be beholden to the members who have held hostage his bid to be speaker.

For House Republicans on either side of the speaker’s drama, one big question is how their constituents react. Representative Darin LaHood, a McCarthy supporter who represents a conservative district in central and Northern Illinois, said there was “no support in my district for what these guys are doing.”

Martha Zoller, a conservative talk radio host in northeast Georgia, said she had heard this week from several local party organizations that are upset with Representative Andrew Clyde, the area’s Republican congressman, over his opposition to Mr. McCarthy.

Yet while Ms. Zoller said she was partial to Mr. McCarthy as a House Republican leader, she said she and others in her corner of Georgia would like to see Republicans move on from Ms. McDaniel, whom she blamed for the party’s poor midterm showing.

“She orchestrated a lot of losses,” Ms. Zoller said. “It’s kind of like being a head football coach. When you lose, sometimes you’ve got to take the hit, even when it wasn’t your fault, and you’ve got to move on.”

In Washington, Republicans aligned with Mr. McCarthy found themselves increasingly agitated at a turn of events that had left their party paralyzed.

“I don’t blame the public if they take a negative view,” said Representative Don Bacon of Nebraska, who labeled the anti-McCarthy cadre “the Taliban 19” before its numbers grew. “This is dysfunctional, and I hate it myself. I can understand if the public does, too.”

Erdogan asks Putin to declare 'unilateral' Ukraine ceasefire

The Turkish and Russian leaders held a telephone conversation to discuss recent developments in Ukraine.

Le Monde

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan pressed his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to declare a "unilateral" ceasefire in Ukraine on Thursday, January 5.

"President Erdogan said that calls for peace and negotiations should be supported by a unilateral ceasefire and a vision for a fair solution," the Turkish presidency said following a telephone conversation between Mr. Erdogan and Mr. Putin.

Every morning, a selection of articles from Le Monde In English straight to your inbox

Mr. Erdogan was due to hold a separate conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky later on Thursday.

The Turkish leader, who refused to join Western sanctions on Russia, has used his relations with both Moscow and Kyiv to try and mediate an end to the war. Turkey hosted two early rounds of peace talks and helped strike a United Nations-backed agreement restoring Ukrainian grain deliveries across the Black Sea.

Mr. Erdogan has also repeatedly tried to bring Mr. Putin and Mr. Zelensky to Turkey for a peace summit.

Russia's spiritual leader, Patriarch Kirill, called for a one-day ceasefire in Ukraine on Orthodox Christmas, celebrated this week by both countries.

Putin's Man at the BND?German Intelligence Rocked By Russian Espionage Scandal

Germany's foreign intelligence agency, the BND, has been rocked by an espionage scandal centered around one of its staffers. The man, who is suspected of having spied for Russia, works in a department that provides critical intelligence in the Ukraine war.

By Maik Baumgärtner, Jörg Diehl, Matthias Gebauer, Martin Knobbe, Roman Lehberger, Ann-Katrin Müller, Fidelius Schmid und Wolf Wiedmann-Schmidt

Spiegel

04.01.2023

Thomas Haldenwang, the head of Germany’s Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), the country’s domestic intelligence agency, had clear words when he spoke about Russian intelligence services before the federal parliament, the Bundestag, in mid-October. He called Russia an "aggressive actor with dishonest means and motives." Two years earlier, he had already warned of an "alarming brutalization" of its methods. Russia's invasion of Ukraine, he said, represented an "aggravation of all previous factors."

To the left of Haldenwang, wearing a blue shirt with a purple tie and rimless glasses, sat Bruno Kahl, the president of the BND, Germany’s foreign intelligence service. He seemed relaxed on October 17, likely unaware at that time that his own agency had probably become a victim of that Russian aggression. Or he didn't let on about it.

On December 21, officers of the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) arrested Carsten L., the head of a BND unit, in Berlin. German Federal Prosecutor Peter Frank has accused him of providing Russia with classified intelligence information.

Two months after that October session in parliament, Kahl was forced to admit on the Thursday before Christmas Eve that there was "a possible case of treason" within his own ranks. "Restraint and discretion" are "very important in this particular case," Kahl said, adding that any details that become public would benefit Russia.

But what could be more useful to Moscow than a source right at the heart of Germany’s foreign intelligence service, with access to a whole trove of secret documents?

Was the Danger Underestimated?

It appears that the worst espionage case in years may currently be brewing in Germany. And it is hitting the very agency that didn't exactly shine with its foresight in the run-up to the Russian attack on Ukraine, long dismissing warnings from the United States and British intelligence services about the impending war.

The case is weighing heavy on the entire German government, which dithered over arms deliveries to Ukraine, at least in the first months of the invasion. Now it must face questions from its partner services around the world about a Russian mole inside the BND. Did the Germans underestimate the danger?

Berlin remained silent on the issue over the holidays. Only Federal Justice Minister Marco Buschmann of the business-friendly Free Democratic Party (FDP) commented, making a desperate attempt to spin the whole affair into a success. He said that an "important blow against Russian espionage" may have been struck.

Sebastian Fiedler, the point man for criminal policy for the parliamentary group of the center-left Social Democrats (SPD) in the Bundestag, considers this reaction to be "somewhat exaggerated." Ultimately, the operation against Carsten L. had been a success. "But above all, we now see what Russia is willing and capable of doing – in agencies, the economy and politics."

It's not a short list. Former KGB agent Vladimir Putin has upgraded his intelligence services to become the most important pillar of his power apparatus. They are a key element of his broad offensive  against the West.

Russian intelligence services influence political parties in democracies and elsewhere, interfere in free elections, foment protests in the West with false information, infiltrate the computer networks of Western governments, assassinate dissidents and compromise Western public servants.

Warnings from German Authorities Ignored

But decision-makers in Germany preferred to pretend that the shadow war with Russia was over. They largely ignored warnings from Germany's own security authorities, and they underestimated the ambition for supremacy held by Putin, who has been Russia’s president since late 1999, with one interruption when he served as prime minister due to term limits.

When incidents did occur, such as the murder  of Georgian asylum-seeker Zelimkhan Khangoshvili in Kleiner Tiergarten park in Berlin at the behest of the Russian domestic intelligence service FSB, the German government expelled a moderate number of Russian diplomats from the country. They apparently didn’t want to upset the other side too much and were afraid that they would no longer be able to run their own embassy in Moscow properly if the Kremlin expelled just as many diplomats in return.

For years, the counterintelligence departments of the BfV and the Military Counterintelligence Service suffered from chronic staff shortages. Counter-intelligence efforts at the BND – the investigation and infiltration of foreign intelligence services – were discontinued during the tenure of Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, a friend of Putin’s, in 2002. Even within the security authorities, many viewed the decision as a mistake.

Marc Polymeropoulos, the former head of operations for the CIA in Europe and Eurasia, says his warnings about Russian spies repeatedly "fell on deaf ears" in Germany. "Russia treated Europe like its playground," he says.

Officials with Eastern European intelligence services sometimes express themselves even more sharply: They were long treated by Berlin with arrogance, says one source. The source says the BND dismissed them as not being objective. "Nobody understands Russia as well as we do," was the subtext coming from the ranks of the BND, says the source.

The BND first moved to reestablish its own counterintelligence unit in 2017. German intelligence officers had to start from scratch in many places and undergo the painstaking process of acquiring new sources. Until recently, only around three dozen BND employees worked in this area.

Still, counterintelligence at the BfV domestic intelligence agency has been significantly beefed up. Recently, several Russian informers were caught in the net – though they were rather small fish: a man who passed on property plans of the German Bundestag, a Russian-born doctoral student at the University of Augsburg who had provided information to the foreign intelligence service SWR and a security guard at the British Embassy in Berlin.

Tip from Abroad Led to Suspected Double Agent

But the case of Carsten L., even if BND head Kahl has tried to present it as such, cannot be cited as evidence of increased efforts by the German intelligence services.

Shortly before Christmas, Kahl said the service had learned about the case "in the course of its intelligence work." It sounded as though the agency had discovered the suspected traitor within its ranks on its own. But that’s not what happened.

L.'s undoing was that another Western intelligence service discovered a data set in the Russian apparatus that was clearly attributable to the BND. The data included findings about Russia. It's possible that it also contained information on the BND's methods and sources. The data reportedly included findings from telecommunications surveillance that may have just been photographed from a screen.

It was only after the warning that the BND succeeded in identifying Carsten L. as the suspected mole. The agency spent weeks observing him.

In the process, another person working for the BND also came into the investigators' sights. The federal prosecutor has listed the second person as a defendant in the proceedings. She is also alleged to have opened documents on her work computer that are relevant to the investigation. However, insiders report that it is now considered unlikely that the person in question worked for the Russians. They say it is more likely that Carsten L. had tried to divert suspicion from himself through her.

Prosecutors Suspect Serious Treason

Investigators from the Federal Prosecutor’s Office and the BKA are still working to clarify the full scope of the incident and much remains unclear. Carsten L. hasn't yet commented on the accusations, with his defense attorneys thus far declining to comment.

One thing that remains hazy is a possible motive: nothing is known about any possible financial worries the suspect may have had. The officer from the Bundeswehr armed forces was working for the BND and lived with his wife and children in Bavaria. He had reportedly encountered frustrations in his job, but that's not so unusual.

The federal prosecutor is investigating the BND agent not on suspicion of "intelligence agent activity" but of "aggravated treason." It’s a far more serious accusation.

If that crime is proven, Carsten L. would have created "the risk of serious detriment to the external security of the Federal Republic of Germany" by betraying a state secret and abusing his position of responsibility to do so. That's what Section 94 of the German Criminal Code states. So, this isn't just about a civil servant providing a few official secrets. The defendant could face a prison sentence of five years to life.

The case would be unique in the recent history of the BND. The only other case that has shaken the foreign intelligence service to a similar degree is that of Markus R.

When the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution tracked down the official in 2014, they thought they were on the trail of a traitor working on Moscow’s behalf. He had offered secret documents to the Russian Consulate General in Munich. But it only became clear after his arrest that R. had actually been working for the CIA, the intelligence service of Germany's most important ally. A court sentenced him to eight years in prison.

Carsten L. also had access to a wealth of documents in his function as a unit head in the Technical Intelligence (TA) department. Investigators are still in the dark over how much information he may have supplied to Russian services and over what period of time.

A Life of Its Own

The TA department has been the source of scandals in the past. As the investigative committee on the National Security Agency (NSA) scandal, which was in session until 2017, showed, it had developed a life of its own that neither top authorities nor the Chancellery could control.

As such, former BND President Gerhard Schindler also considers it a mistake that more than 1,000 employees with the TA unit remained in Pullach, Bavaria, at the time the BND moved its headquarters to Berlin. "That, of course, makes administrative supervision difficult," he says.

At the same time, Technical Intelligence has become something of the heart of the intelligence enterprise. Employees comb through internet data streams, intercept emails and tap into phone calls and radio traffic. Around half of the several hundred reports that the BND produces each day come from the TA.

Even if the intelligence service hasn't always been respected by its partners in recent times, the TA had an excellent international reputation. One reason is that the BND still uses an outdated wiretapping method that other intelligence agencies have abandoned, and is thus able to intercept Russian military communications, for example. Since the outbreak of the war, the findings from signals intelligence at Pullach have been among the West's strongest information that they have been able to supply to the Ukrainian armed forces in the war against Russia.

And now it is this unit that has been hit by what is likely to be a dramatic leak. The consequences are hard to foresee.

Intelligence Services Need a Radical Overhaul

"The threats and hostilities against our democracy are currently massive. Illegitimate efforts to assert influence, propaganda and espionage are relevant and acute areas where our security agencies need to be much better, more resilient and sharper," says Konstantin von Notz, a member of the parliament with the Green Party and the chairman of the Parliamentary Oversight Panel for the intelligence services. It's not just the military that Germany needs to radically overhaul, he says, but "also in the area of intelligence services, and that's why we have to underpin that legally as part of the reorganization of the law for these security agencies."

The extent of the Russians' espionage activities in Europe is illustrated by cases from other countries. The Netherlands caught an "illegal" with the military intelligence GRU, who was to be smuggled in as an intern at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. In Norway, investigators uncovered a scientist who had been spying for the Russians. Meanwhile, Sweden caught two GRU operatives who had infiltrated the security agencies there. And DER SPIEGEL and its reporting partners exposed a GRU spy who had been targeting NATO and U.S. naval bases for years.

Note: if you are interested in this subject, Germán & Co has written a series of essays on this topic.

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