A populist movement is gaining momentum on the national stage under President-elect Donald Trump, and its effects may soon trickle down to state politics, according to 1819 News CEO Bryan Dawson.
On the first episode of "1819 News: The Podcast" for the new year, Dawson defined populism as the "combined political force of the working class" now represented by the Republican Party, thanks to Trump's focus on issues facing America's working class.
While true for national policies, Dawson said Alabama, despite being ruby-red Republican, is still largely controlled by corporations and special interests. However, if Trump's landslide reelection victory is any indication, that all may soon change.
"The only reason that the chamber of commerce and anything has any power in the state is because they've been able to fool the people into thinking that the corporations care about them," Dawson said.
"Once the people wake up to the fact that these corporations that are funding all these politicians and everything else don't care, their money to these politicians will be poison and the people are going to take over the party. And so these big corporations need to be very careful as they, you know, have this allure and this affair with Marxism, and they're pursuing this stuff because they're scared to death of the woke mob. They need to be scared of the righteous mob, which is the populists."
Dawson said that because Alabama is solidly Republican, the primary elections are more important than the general elections, which is something conservative voters need to realize in order to take back control of their state.
"We need to get everyone in Alabama to understand that the most important elections in this state happen in the primary, which is at the beginning of the year, March, April, May, whenever it is, it's in the primaries, and then it's in the runoffs. That's where we choose our governor. That's where we choose our United States senator," he said. "It's not November. We're not gonna have a governor lose to a Democrat. We're not gonna have a U.S. senator lose to a Democrat… They're not gonna lose to the Democrats, so when are they actually being elected? They're being elected in the primary, and so the primary focus should be the primary."
He continued, "We've got to get back to that, and I believe if the populists, if the conservatives, if the Trump-voting, MAGA America First patriots knew that that was the case and we could get them to show up to the primaries the way that they show up for Trump, you see a radically different state, okay? You see radically different representation on down, like from the top on down."
Dawson predicted a coming political shift in Alabama, where corporations and politicians will either give the populist movement a seat at the table or face a "revolt."
"Could you at least give us some representation in this setup that we have?" he said. "If that doesn't begin to happen, I think what you're going to see is a full-blown populist working-class revolt, where we take over the Republican Party. That's what I see happening."
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