The Guardian view on the return of Donald Trump: plotting a hostile takeover | Editorial

Nationally, the former president is a vote loser. The trouble for Republicans is his grip over the party rank and file

In the United States, the Republican party has been unmistakably corrupted by power. Its leadership did not call out Donald Trump for his high crimes and misdemeanors", his savage politics, his cruelty, his lies and his conspiracy theories. Voters had to wait until Senate Republicans had refused to convict Mr Trump of impeachable crimes before their leader, Mitch McConnell, would speak truth to power. By then, the question was not whether there was a war over the soul of the party but whether Republicans had a soul worth fighting for.

At the weekend Mr Trump revealed that there would be payback for Mr McConnell and other Republican lawmakers for their disloyalty". In a speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference, Mr Trump flirted with running again in 2024 and took swipes at the Biden White House. But he reserved his punches for his own side - targeting Republicans In Name Only" who voted to impeach him and criticised his incitement of the mob that stormed Capitol Hill in January.