Republicans, after all, do have a “new generation” looking to assume leadership—28 states have Republican governors, and broadly speaking these states have vastly outperformed Democratic-led states over the last four years, including during the pandemic, on a host of issues important to voters.

Even so, there’s little to suggest that anything will change in Democrats’ rhetoric—even if Trump steps aside or is forced to do so. Maher’s revealing 2016 monologue is a reminder that words like “fascist,” “dictator,” and “autocrat” have become part of the Left’s regular language, now aimed at anyone espousing ideas that barely a decade ago would have been considered moderate, even mainstream. Already, left-leaning critics are hurling such epithets at the most visible of the GOP’s new leaders.

Florida governor Ron DeSantis leads a state that has performed well on many economic and Covid-related measures—but he can already attest to what awaits future Republican candidates. Charlie Crist, a Democrat who wants DeSantis’s job, recently called him an “autocrat that would love to be the dictator of Florida, and then America.” Another Democratic candidate, Nikki Fried, called DeSantis “the greatest threat to democracy in the entire country”—a stature DeSantis has apparently taken from Trump. The New Yorker recently described DeSantis as a candidate who “channels the same rage as the former President, but with more discipline.” Meantime, California governor Gavin Newsom, who fancies himself a Democratic alternative if President Biden bows out in 2024, has run ads in Florida inviting residents and businesses to move to the Golden State to enjoy the freedoms there—a mystifying approach, considering that Florida is ranked among the freest states and California among the least free.