Republicans on my TL say that this isn't the party they know. Friends of good will who love our state and country. But there's through line to this moment, rarely broken.

GoldwaterNixonReaganBush 1...Trump.

Reagan was the worst 'till now.

Harsh? Walk with me. 1/?

1963 - Gov. Wallace links "states rights" to segregation. Clashes with the fed. govt as a way of conflating the two. He backs the KKK.

In '64, Goldwater opposes the Civil Rights Act as a fed. overreach - and becomes first GOP candidate to win LA/GA/MI/SC since Reconstruction 2/?

In '68, Nixon looks at this new map and begins the Southern Strategy; H.R Haldeman his chief of staff sets out to design a political strategy that makes plain to white folk that the problem is "the blacks" but "doesn't appear [racist]" 3/?

In that '68 election, the combination of George Wallace (runs as an independent) and Nixon (R) win AK, LA, GA, MI, VA, TN, NC, SC, FL. Hubert Humphrey (D) wins only Texas. And the contours of the strategy are born. 4/?

Enter Reagan, famed conservative hero who would later perfect this stratagem: in 1971, after the UN recognizes China, Reagan, then Gov. of CA, calls Nixon to complain about how "those monkeys from those African countries" voted. Nixon laughs. Audio: 5/?

In '81, when asked how Reagan gets to the Wallace voter, Atwater, chief strategist says quote "You start out in '54 by saying 'nigger.' By '68 you can't say nigger. So you say stuff like forced busing and states rights...and a byproduct is blacks get hurt worse than whites." 6/?

In 1980, candidate Ronald Reagan appears in Mississippi and states "I believe in states rights," attacks "welfare queens," forced busing and affirmative action. Studies as recent as 2015 demonstrate that tropes trigger in the minds of whites negative stereotypes of blacks. 7/?

Let me pause b/c some might ask: are you, a proud resident of Illinois saying that Ronald Reagan, proud son of Eureka, IL and a darling figure of the conservative movement was a racist? Well: Reagan's own words and those of his aides answer affirmatively. @ me. 8/?

I'll come to a quick hitting close crossing time periods:

'88: Under Atwater, George HW Bush runs the Willie Horton ad.

'12: Mitt Romney calls for "self deportation" of immigrants.

9/?

And @realDonaldTrump? Well.
- He says Mexicans are rapists
- Calls black countries "shithole" countries.
- Says good people on both sides of Charlottesville
- Brown kids in cages

He lies repeatedly that fairly cast votes in majority black cities are fraudulent and stolen. 10/?

Today, a mostly white mob stoked by decades of this rhetoric storms the capitol. Uh.. what are you surprised by? What part of this arc of history makes Trump anything other than a logical outgrowth of the trajectory of the Republican party for more than half a century? 11/14

I'm a lifelong Democrat. My party has plenty of issues on race. But there is no whataboutism here. Democrats lost the last election and never attempted a violent coup against the government. Simple question to my Republican friends: what're you going to do about it? 12/14

Because we need you. At its best, Republicans are the party of smaller government, fiscal restraint, and an independent American spirit. At its worst, bowed to Trump? It is, quite apparently, a literal coup machine that turns racial kindling into seditious conflagration. 13/14

Our problems are too big to solve divided. And a system where a violent, mostly white mob can storm the seat of US democracy, loot and terrorize, and leave unharmed and free while a black man is shot 7 times in the back and his shooter is uncharged shouldn't long stand. 14/14.