Republican Fascists Often Face ZERO Challengers In Elections

Republicans are using statehouses to enact the most dangerous parts of their agenda, and many of these Republicans actually ran for office without a Democratic opponent. Author David Pepper talks with Ring of Fire's Farron Cousins about why Democrats can no longer sit on the sidelines, even in deep red areas of the country - And his new book is a manual that gives you the motivation and tools to take on the Right.

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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

So a little over a year ago, I spoke with author David Pepper about his book, laboratories of Auto Autocracies, where we discussed, and he discusses in the book the fact that the states across the country, and we've seen this in the news pretty much every day, have become these little horrible examples of how bad things can be in this country. So we talked a lot about how bad things can be. Well, David Pepper is now out with a new book called Saving Democracy, A User's Manual for Every American, where he tells us now how we can fight back. So David Pepper, welcome back to Ring of Fire. And I, I, I love the way you've done this, right? Laboratories of autocracy, we lay out all the problems. Now you're back out there and you're telling us, okay, now that we've identified what's happening, now we know where it's happening, who's doing it, what's going on? Here's how we fight back. And that, of course is, is the crucial piece of the puzzle here. So before we get into the really the content of the book, let, let's talk about your what, what sparked this particular book as the follow up to laboratories of autocracy?

It's so funny cuz in I, when I wrote Laboratories of autocracy, I actu the last 60 pages or so, we're all about what we should do. But I heard, you know, after, after our conversations and others and people read the book, I would hear the same thing every time. Oh my gosh, that is so disturbing. What you described what's happening in Tennessee and Ohio and Florida, it's so awful. They would tell me, I have to keep skipping to the end to see what I can do about it. Or I can't make it through the book because it's so darn disturbing. So once I heard that enough, I thought, you know what the reader's write, I need more on what to do about it. And I want to have a full book about all the things you can do. Very practically, the, the subtitles, literally a user's manual.

What can you do about it? And so we need to understand the problem. And so read the first book if you haven't, and the second book goes through a little bit, but there really is a hunger. And you know, one reason there's a hunger is because I think once, if you have a mindset, which is the, unfortunately the national narrative is that it all starts and ends in Washington and it's all about DOJ cases. And if you're the average person sitting at home and you're not in the swing stater in DC you literally are left with a conclusion. I can't do anything about the decline of democracy. It's the most disempowering narrative ever. Well, once you realize that actually the battle for democracy is in every state, it's in red states, blue states, and the reason it's succeeding in those states is cuz no one thinks they can do anything about it.

They think it's about DC is, that's sobering, but my hope is empowering cuz then you realize, oh my gosh, there's so much I can do about it because it's right where I live. You know, whether it's running or going to that school board meeting or signing up to be an elections official or ending censorship. I go through. Once you see that it's in your neighborhood and in your state, the truth is the options become almost limitless about what you can do about it versus sitting at home and watching it on MSNBC and thinking you can't do anything. You know, the book goes all of that for people.

You, you know, you bring up a really good point there, especially with, you know, school boards because that has, obviously in the last couple years that has become a hotbed, uh, of Republican takeover. I mean, we've seen it down here where I am in Florida.