You might not recognize this guy. It is a much younger picture of him. He is J. Michael Luttig. A bit of background. He graduated with a Juris Doctor from the University of Virginia Law School back in 1981. He worked in the Reagan Administration. In 1991 George H. W. Bush nominated him to the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. Luttig was compared to Supreme Court Justice Scalia for his Judicial philosophy. Luttig was interviewed by George W. Bush to fill one of two Supreme Court vacancies in 2005. Luttig lost out to John Roberts and Samuel Alito. Luttig had more than 40 of his law clerks go on to clerk with conservative justices of the Supreme Court. This guy is no bleeding-heart liberal. Luttig is a conservative Republican icon.

You may remember Luttig testifying in June of 2022 to the January 6 Committee. It was painful to watch in that Luttig was recovering from his stroke and his words were halting. He said that Trump had instigated a war on democracy so that he could cling to power. These were his closing remarks at the hearing.

“Donald Trump and his allies and supporters are a clear and present danger to American democracy. They would attempt to overturn that 2024 election in the same way that they attempted to overturn the 2020 election, but succeed in 2024 where they failed in 2020. I don’t speak those words lightly. I would have never spoken those words ever in my life, except that that’s what the former president and his allies are telling us.”

Remember, this is a true-blue Republican conservative saying this.

Luttig attacked the Republican base on Sunday in a New York Time opinion piece, calling the base spineless. He added,

“If the indictment of Mr. Trump on Espionage Act charges – not to mention his now almost certain indictment for conspiring to obstruct Congress from certifying Mr. Biden as the president on Jan. 6 – fails to shake the Republican Party from its moribund political senses, then it is beyond saving itself. Nor ought it be saved.”

In an ordinary time, his words would strike home. These are not ordinary times. These are times of Trump, Jordan, Gaetz, Boebert and Greene. All of these people were involved in January. The last four people mentioned are House Members. Trump is dragging down the Republican Party. The nightmare is that Trump might drag down to American democracy, as well.