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The Brooks Brothers Insurrection

Governor Ron DeSantis signs Floridas 15-week abortion ban
DeSantis recently railed against the “woke mind virus." Photo: Paul Hennessy/Getty Images
Tina Nguyen
October 5, 2022

Last month’s third annual National Conservative Conference—the now yearly convention of the academics and public intellectuals trying to build an ideological structure inside the MAGA movement—was notable, at first blush, for two things. First, its relocation from Orlando to Miami, the New Right mecca for crypto-friendly, vax-skeptical, post-Trump futurists. And second, its bewildering fusion of isolationists and neocons, evangelicals, homosexuals, and, yes, a few monarchists, all united against a common enemy: the libs. 

The future of Trumpism, after all, begins with coalition-building to articulate an agenda that can survive Trump, himself. So far, it’s more dark vibes than uplifting policy. A video promo for the NatCon event, which opened with footage of cars on fire and protesters tearing down Confederate statues, declared “woke neo-Marxism is destroying the values and principles America, Britain, and other Western nations have held dear for centuries.” Not exactly “Morning in America.”