Mercieca is a professor of communication at Texas A&M University. Shaffer is an associate professor at Kansas State University.
When the governing body of the Republican Party called the events of Jan. 6, 2021, “legitimate public discourse,” it renewed a sometimes-furious debate about what are, and aren’t, acceptable forms of discussion and debate in a democratic society.
This question has emerged frequently in recent years, with complaints about inappropriate methods of protest, efforts to take particular viewpoints off social media, and accusations that various people are disseminating misleading information. But the issue took on new urgency on Feb. 4, 2022, when the Republican National Committee censured U.S. Reps. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois.
They are the only Republicans serving on the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. The governing body of the Republican Party said this meant they were “participating in a Democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse.”
As researchers who study the relationship between communication and democracy, we believe our insights can help citizens draw the line between “legitimate political discourse” and illegitimate political violence.
There are legal standards defining protected speech, but something that meets the legal definitions may not necessarily help build and maintain democracy. Scholarly definitions of the types of speech that are beneficial for democracy help make the issues clearer.
Persuasion, not coercion
Put most simply, speech that is designed to teach people about other viewpoints and persuade them to change their minds – rather than pressuring them to take different actions – is good for democracy.
The key, as pointed out by communication scholar Daniel O'Keefe, is that the audience has “ some measure of freedom ” about receiving the message and choosing how to act upon it.
Persuasion, even in its most vigorous and aggressive form, is an invitation. When a person seeks to persuade someone else to agree with their viewpoint or values, or to recall or ignore history in a particular way, the recipient may choose to go along, or not.
Coercion, on the other hand, is a kind of force – a command, not an invitation. Coercion denies others the freedom to choose for themselves whether to agree or disagree. Coercion and violence are anti-democratic because they deny others their ability to consent. Violence and coercion are the very opposite of legitimate political discourse.
Politics is not war, and legitimate political discourse is not violence.
‘Be a citizen, not a partisan,’ says Jennifer Mercieca, a historian of political discourse.
What about protest?
Protests can take many forms. In their most democratic form, political scientist Mary Scudder notes that protests “ can improve the deliberativeness of a political system by putting important problems on the agenda or introducing new arguments into the public sphere.” Protest helps people to be aware of the views held by others, even if different groups disagree vehemently.
In the name of democracy, scholars of communication, free speech and deliberation have said protesters deserve to be heard and given as much latitude as possible to communicate with the public. In part, that is because protesters may represent underprivileged or mistreated people whose messages may be hard for powerful interests to hear.
But impassioned protest can sometimes seem like an attempt at coercion, especially for people who feel targeted by the protesters’ messages.
Persuasion and coercion on Jan. 6
The Republican National Committee would like Americans to focus on the peaceful protesters who gathered on Jan. 6, 2021, to hear President Donald Trump’s speech at the Ellipse – and ignore the violence at the Capitol.
If we look at the Ellipse, we see a vibrant, and legitimate, political protest with signs, chants and speeches. If we look at the Capitol, by contrast, we see illegitimate political violence, including people using bear spray, erecting a hangman’s noose and assaulting others.
The link between them was Trump’s speech. He used a particular combination of rhetorical strategies, calling for a plague to be removed so that the nation could be pure again; threatening force; and claiming that his group was good, strong, pure and sure of victory. He also made claims of victimhood, of having had something stolen from him and his supporters. This specific combination of rhetorical strategies has traditionally been used to motivate a nation for war.
That type of communication from a president can be legitimate political discourse when used to motivate a nation to war against another nation, though there have certainly been circumstances in American history in which that
power has been abused. But when the president uses that rhetoric against the democratic process in his own government in order to retain power, it is not legitimate political discourse. Rather, as scholars of authoritarianism have explained, using war rhetoric against your own nation amounts to an “autogolpe,” or “self-coup.”
When Trump urged the Ellipse crowd to march to the Capitol and “ fight like hell,” his words transformed an occasion of legitimate political discourse into an anti-democratic violent insurrection.
The result was real physical violence, characterized by Capitol Police Sgt. Aquilino Gonell, a 42-year-old veteran of the war in Iraq, as a “ medieval battle.” Several people died and many were injured.
American democracy was damaged as well. Lisa Murkowski, a Republican U.S. senator from Alaska, called the Republican National Committee’s characterization “false” and “wrong,” saying on Feb. 5, 2022, that the events at the Capitol were “ an effort to overturn a lawful election.”
Democracy isn’t a game. To respond with appropriate seriousness, Americans can’t frame moments such as Jan. 6 simply as a “ competition between left versus right, Democrat versus Republican; a battle of individuals and political factions,” writes communications scholar Dannagal Young. Those violent, coercive events are challenges to the real heart of democracy: peaceful persuasion and the rule of law.
Looking at the entirety of what occurred on Jan. 6, 2021, it’s clear that there was both legitimate protest and illegitimate political violence. When political violence replaces political discourse, and when political leaders refuse to play by the democratic rules of the game, democracies weaken, and may even die.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Click here to read the original article.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.