The meta narrative about last year’s US election is that Donald Trump was able to unite a broad conservative coalition, and bring in new members (Latinos and young men), while Democrats failed to hold their coalition together and lost working-class voters turned off by the party’s embrace of “woke” distractions.

Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts (left), Nick Fuentes (second right) and Tucker Carlson. Credit: Illustration by Dionne Gain

This unity on the right – save for some establishment Republicans who could not stomach Trump – has largely withstood the president’s first year back in power.

But there is now a civil war unfolding over racism, antisemitism and US support for Israel; one with long-term implications for the Make America Great Again coalition beyond Trump.

This schism – which is not new – was turbocharged by right-wing commentator Tucker Carlson’s sympathetic interview with white nationalist activist Nick Fuentes a fortnight ago.

For those unfamiliar, Carlson was sacked by Fox News in 2023. He now broadcasts his own content to 5 million YouTube followers, including last year’s awkward interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and chats with numerous other outlandish or conspiratorial figures.

Fuentes, 27, is an avowed white Christian nationalist and widely described as an antisemite. His America First Foundation says it fights “foreign and immoral ideologies like Zionism, nihilism, and liberal multiculturalism”. Fuentes, who has 1 million followers on X, has spoken of telling his parents: “Hitler was awesome, Hitler was right, and the Holocaust didn’t happen.”

Carlson’s friendly sit-down with Fuentes might be dismissed as pesky provocation from a man........

© Brisbane Times