"Over time, fatigue, partisan anger, and political neccesity had hardened Republicans. They were developing the inddifeence to protect a tyrant. What these politicians needed, was a rational for this increasingly militan devotion. So they began to convince themselves that the president's enemies were the greater threat. More and more Republicans told one another, and came to believe, that Democrats would do anything to destroy the country. And that paranoid fantasy gave Republicans the justification they needed to do anything in Trump's defense."

"But as Trump’s base became the party’s base, there was one more reason to give in: Republican politicians who embraced him would be loved. And the more fiercely these politicians affirmed his view of the world, reviling his enemies and defending his abuses of power, the more love they would get.

...

To rationalize their increasingly militant devotion, they convinced themselves that the president’s enemies were the greater threat. They claimed that Democrats would do anything to destroy Trump and the country. And that paranoid fantasy created a permission structure for Republicans to do anything in Trump’s defense."