Quisling is the surname of Vidkun Quisling, fascist dictator of Norway who collaborated enthusiastically with the Nazi invaders in WWII. His name soon became and remains a common noun meaning one who betrays his nation by collaborating with an occupying enemy. Some have applied the term to Donald Trump because of his slavish accommodations of the Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. But I want to name a few more people in American politics who could be called quislings. I begin with the premise that Trump is a virtual dictator and that Trumpism is an anti-democratic ideology and hostile occupying force. 

So who are our quislings? Surely the Republicans in Congress cannot escape the opprobrium that attaches to slavish collaborators who have betrayed American democracy. The Republican Party was already bankrupt, so Trump bought it up cheap. Some amoral Republicans found Trumpism congenial. Many more thought they would find Trump and Trumpism useful, i.e., it could keep them in office. Others who found Trump and Trumpism offensive went along and kept silence because they were afraid of persecution by Trump and because the Republican Party has long been a lock-step institution.

Then there are Trump’s appointees. His White House staff had quislings in it from the first and recruited ever more quislings to replace the honest people who were driven out. The incompetents and saboteurs whom Trump appointed and continues to appoint to important government positions are quislings whose loyalty to country had been displaced by loyalty to Trump. Mitch McConnell and his Republican Senate without hesitation or thought rubber stamped Trump’s appointments to the judiciary. Some of these judges are fine jurists, some of them are surely incompetent ideologues who will be quislings.

Now we have some notable quislings coming to the fore. When Rep. Louie Gohmert’s attempt to undo the recent election was thwarted in court, Louie then declared “Basically, in effect, the ruling would be that you’ve got to go to the streets and be as violent as antifa and BLM.” Louie cannot be criminally prosecuted for incitement to violence on the basis of these words alone, but they add a shine to his reputation as a quisling.

Then we have Missouri’s disgrace, Senator Josh Hawley, who is promoting Trump’s “lost cause” in order to flatter Trump and his base and make that base his own. Hawley knows America’s democratic institutions and procedures very well, and has pledged again and again his commitment to preserve them. Looks like he changed his mind and decided it is in his interest to be a quisling.

A late-comer to the quisling squad is Sen. Ted Cruz. Cruz, a veteran sleaze and every bit as ambitious as Hawley. So I would have expected the other quislings to ask him to stand down because of his malodorous reputation. But no, anyone who in his heart wants to be a quisling is welcome.

Trump’s defeat will not make these quislings go away, so we had better recognize them for what they are.