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Right wing to Far right

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Someone else mentioned this too. Why it isn't labelled as right wing to far right? Trump has clearly criticized former Republican governance and has abandoned neoliberalism and globalism as party policy. Also Trump and Republican Party have associated themselves with parties and people which are labelled as right wing to far right such as UKIP and Farage, Fidesz and Orban. Republican Party position of political spectrum really needs to be changed to right wing to far right so people know exactly what Republican Party actually believes or is situated on political spectrum and not this erroneous identification. 86.124.126.108 (talk) 06:13, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Do you have reliable sources for this? Regardless of our personal political views--I voted for Harris and agree with the Democratic Party on most issues--the fact Trump won the popular vote in 2024 means that roughly half the country supported his agenda. See WP:SOAPBOX, and there have been plenty of discussions on this. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 00:42, 10 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The idea that a candidate who wins an election cannot possibly be far-right is just silly. Extremist candidates do sometimes win the popular vote. — Red XIV (talk) 19:09, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
A lot of editors have argued that although the Democratic Party is not center-left by international standards, it should be called center-left because it is by U.S. standards. Accordingly, if 50% voted for Donald Trump, they must be center-right.
I notice too that Meloni's party is described as center-right. Considering that she the Fascist youth leader and her party is a successor to Mussolini's Fascist Party, the definition of center-right is pretty elastic. My solution would be to remove these labels as there is no correct answer and the fields provide no meaningful information. TFD (talk) 21:05, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That's...not how it works at all. Winning 50% of the vote (which Trump actually fell just short of, but I suppose 49.9% is close enough) does not mean they "must be center-right". The notion that only the center-left or center-right can ever win an election is absurd. It's entirely possible for a party that's either far-right or far-left by its own nation's standards to win an election.
Also, since when is Meloni's party labeled as center-right? Its infobox lists it as "right-wing to far-right". You seem to be mistaking the "centre-right coalition" (an alliance of Italian parties ranging from center-right to far-right), of which Brothers of Italy is a member, with Brothers of Italy's own political position. — Red XIV (talk) 15:50, 24 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Which is why I don't think we should determine position on the political spectrum differently in each country. TFD (talk) 16:42, 24 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The alliance that Meloni is the leader of is called the center right coalition. It’s most likely in reference to that rather than her actual political position 2601:804:8700:17D0:EC66:5280:53A1:7D50 (talk) 05:08, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The alliance that Meloni is the leader of is called the center right coalition. It’s most likely in reference to that rather than her actual political position 2601:804:8700:17D0:EC66:5280:53A1:7D50 (talk) 05:09, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The Nazi party got 30% of the votes I doubt you’d call them center right Natalieeeeeee (talk) 15:14, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, where's your reliable sources then? 220.245.162.215 (talk) 07:58, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Someone winning the election and calling the candidate "far right" is not the same as the entire political party. There is far too much bias in these recent edits and in these replies.
Someone could easily argue that Biden, Harris, Obama were/are "far left", but does that mean the party is far left as a whole? Everyone knows that "far" in combination with left/right is a slur, and it is also entirely objective. To make this defacto claim on either political party's page is simply propaganda, unless either party officially announced that they hold that position on the political spectrum.
Additionally, the person who made all these recent changes (Kedamomo999) claims there was a consensus here. There was not, and the intent seems obviously politically driven. The sources cited by this person are left leaning, and it would be no different than citing Fox News as a source on the Democrat Party's page. 146.86.160.101 (talk) 02:05, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"Everyone knows that "far" in combination with left/right is a slur"
I strongly disagree. Plenty of people would consider themselves "far left" or "far right" and believe that that is the logical place to land on the political spectrum. Joejoe1864 (talk) 00:45, 9 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think there's a very strong difference between... What did Biden do again? Pardon federal prisoners convicted of simple possession of cannabis, reinstate DACA, have Medicare negotiate drug prices, impose a strict COVID response with stimulus checks... I struggle to find any radical positions from Biden. Not on the same level as withdrawing the US from international efforts such as climate change research and WHO, completely reversing LGBTQ rights, and greatly expanding the power of the president. It would be very difficult to seriously argue Biden is representing a political fringe, but Trump is acting much more aggressively with his executive orders, and that's why he's considered far-right. LeftyTightyRightyLoosy (talk) 20:07, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Does this mean that if AfD hypothetically wins 51% of the vote in the upcoming German elections, the "far right" label would have to be removed from their party? That makes no sense. Joejoe1864 (talk) 22:19, 25 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Please, for all that is holy and just - back this claim up with sources. Take five minutes to browse the talk page. This is a discussion we have had a million times. Carlp941 (talk) 23:31, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
At the very least it should be labelled as "center right to far right". Even if we pretend that they still have a "center right" wing of the party, there's no possible way to deny that a significant portion of the party is "far right". Joejoe1864 (talk) 22:24, 25 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed, let's stop being dishonest with ourselves, we all know it is. Billie Lean (talk) 18:53, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
To back up your point, the Wikipedia page for Trumpism had the Ideology section changed to just say far-right a couple days ago as of 2/11/2025. Considering Trumpism's influence on the Republican Party, I do not think it is far-fetched or biased to say that the party currently covers that part of the ideological spectrum. ThePoggingEditor (talk) 18:52, 11 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Support adding far-right in some form. As stated above, if Trumpism is fully categorized as far-right, then the Republican Party logically must at least have a far-right faction. I don't see why it's getting opposition, as "center-right to far-right" is an accurate descriptor of the party (if not a bit too moderate nowadays). LeftyTightyRightyLoosy (talk) 04:26, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yall, they’re throwing sieg heils on a regular basis, If we don’t have sufficient sources to call them far right then that’s a Wikipedia problem. Losasta (talk) 09:14, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I agree because Trumpism, Trump, and JD Vance are all considered right wing to far right in the media. It is also the dominant strand of Republican ideology so it should be right wing to far right. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hsija (talk • contribs) 02:13, 16 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

RfC on inclusion of "Far-right" as faction ideology in sidebar

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The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
This discussion was procedurally closed by the submitter as malformed.


Wikipedia and multiple reliable sources explicitly refer to the Freedom Caucus as far-right. As the Freedom Caucus represents a not insignificant member of elected officials, and given that the Freedom Caucus is already explicitly in the Caucuses section of the infobar, should "far-right" be included as a faction ideology in the sidebar? It seems to easily meet WP:RS grounds for inclusion. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 15:16, 8 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

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  • Procedural close as malformed and pointless; the opening statement is also not neutral. This has been previously discussed on the talk page, and no new information has been provided. Opening an RfC less than a few hours after a discussion - in which two editors disagreed with you immediately - is baffling, honestly. Toa Nidhiki05 16:10, 8 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    the opening statement is also not neutral.
    I think "This is already considered far right elsewhere on Wikipedia per WP:RS is sufficiently neutral. If there's a specific issue with my phrasing you have let me know and I can try to adjust it to be more neutral.
The above user is right in that it's been discussed, but not with apparent consensus. Given that this article appears to have local WP:OWN concerns, an RfC is appropriate. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 17:13, 8 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Procedural close (Summoned by bot) per WP:BADRFC Keep the RfC statement (and heading) neutrally worded and short.[1] Statements are often phrased as questions, for example: "Should this article say in the lead that John Smith was a contender for the Pulitzer Prize?". The RFC question presupposes what WP:RS would lead us to conclude and is therefore not neutral. Ping me if/when a new question is put which meets the instructions. TarnishedPathtalk 00:49, 9 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm actually struggling to grok how this is WP:BADRFC; there's no presupposition in "this is already the standard used in other articles, should it be applied here" except for a mere factual statement about the phrasing in question already unambiguously passing WP:RS even on controversial topic articles.
    This is sincere, I want to improve this as best I can, but two editors are trying to tell me that the bare minimum of neutrally-worded context is not passing a neutrality smell test, which is interesting because it seems a bit like presupposing that "far right" is inherently not neutral even in cases where it's a mere uncontested description, as it is in the case of the Freedom Caucus. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 16:19, 9 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    The question is Should "far-right" be included as a faction ideology in the sidebar? The rest of your RFC statement is your argument for inclusion. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:36, 9 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    You know what, that's a fair read. I think I'm butting up against WP:BLUESKY here, personally. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 16:44, 9 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    How is far right supposed to be neutral or non-neutral, many parties on Wikipedia have far right description as per the sources. Theofunny (talk) 16:36, 9 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • No (Summoned by bot) - seems prior discussion has happened before and came to consensus of no. not sure there is significant non-op-ed sourcing suggesting republican party is currently far-right... Bluethricecreamman (talk) 16:33, 10 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Suggesting the Republican Party as a whole is far right and that’s not what the RFC is asking, it’s asking if it should be included as a factional ideology per the Freedom Caucus being a significant minority faction, which is unambiguously far right per a lot of WP:RS. The consensus above isn’t a local consensus, it’s a couple of editors shouting down these changes very consistently without articulating why other than that they don’t feel it should be included here. The reason this suggestion is coming up repeatedly is that despite the objections of a select few editors frequently watching this page it’s very, very, very easy to explain why it should be included as a minor factional ideology and its exclusion feels unambiguously editorialized.
    Seriously, the arguments presented above are a mix of “that’s never happening” and “Trump won an election so his party can’t partially be far right.” There’s not a consensus, just persistence, and it requires we keep ignoring WP:RS. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 10:26, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Procedural close as above. Additionally no new arguments are being made here and really it needs a moratorium. — Czello (music) 16:38, 10 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Add my vote as Procedural close. I would also like a moratorium on this topic. I am very open to adding far right as a faction but absolutely nobody ia bringing academic sourcing to this discussion, which is quite frustrating. A pause would do some good and let other elements of the page get some work Carlp941 (talk) 21:27, 10 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I think a moratorium is inappropriate, I think we very clearly can pass WP:RS and procedural close aside, I’m seeing more general objections over its inclusion that are tautological than sourced and explained. The reason this is going to keep coming up is very clearly it should be included in the article, and some editors appear to have a fundamental objection to that which they seem somewhat unwilling to articulate. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 10:18, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm generally against moratoriums because they are in my opinion useless. A RFC which starts to get a bit of momentum for the suggested change implicitly replaces any previous consensus for a moratorium because WP:CCC is a thing. TarnishedPathtalk 10:37, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I also think that there's a few people arguing a local consensus here and if I read everything posted on this, including into the archives somewhat, then there isn't really evidence for a local consensus as much as a handful of very active editors opposing the inclusion of "far right" at any point in the article, without articulating why beyond "we've already established this before, read prior discussions". At no point in this have those opposed to the inclusion of "far right" as a factional ideology explained why the sources provided are insufficient or why we should wholly bifurcate our handling of the Freedom Caucus across this article and the article about them.
    At some point "this keeps coming up" needs to be addressed as an issue with those preventing the inclusion of seriously WP:RS-passing and WP:BLUESKY phrasing rather than the fault of what is clearly a small torrent of editors reasonably noticing that the phrasing in this article is incorrect and lacking nuance. It isn't reasonable to exclude pertinent information from an article due to the vigilance of those who want it excluded for unarticulated reasons. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 10:47, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Even if there was WP:LOCALCON, and I can't comment in that regard because I'm not familiar with the history of discussion on this page, a situation does not exist in which it overrides WP:PAG. TarnishedPathtalk 11:00, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm not very active on this page, I just popped in because it was clearly missing phrasing that passes the standards for inclusion, and it's exclusion is frankly odd. In the above discussions it was never once articulated why it shouldn't be included. I think other editors are feeling that way too, or we wouldn't have this conversation coming up frequently from experienced editors, in contrast to the usual IP drive-by asking why some atomically controversial statement isn't included in the article. I think that what we're seeing with this editing pattern plus the calls for a moratorium feels like a WP:NPOV issue, even if unintentional. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 11:09, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Exactly this, you articulated the point really well. Theofunny (talk) 11:11, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Anyway, we could have a back and forth all day and it wouldn't change that this current RFC is defective. I would recommend you close this discussion, making sure to remove the RFC tag in the process, and start a new RFC discussion of the form
    == RfC: Should "Far-right" be used in the infobox ==
    {{subst:DNAU|5|weeks}}
    Should "far-right" be included as a faction ideology in the sidebar?
    === Polling (RfC: Should "Far-right" be used in the infobox) ===
    __YOUR_ARGUMENT_FOR_WHY_RELIABLE_SOURCES_SUPPORT_THE_CHANGE_GO_HERE__ ps, include the sources you believe support the change (preferably academic sources from subject matter experts in politics).
    === Discussion (RfC: Should "Far-right" be used in the infobox) ===
    general discussion goes here. TarnishedPathtalk 11:11, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I would also support a moratorium on changes to the political position, ideology, and faction sections. Toa Nidhiki05 00:00, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Discussion RfC Should "Far-right" be used in the infobox

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By a straight headcount, 12 editors !voted Yes and 13 No, with a handful of alternate opinions also expressed. Six editors -- unevenly split between Yes and No camps -- indicated it should be added to the list of factions.

The determination of consensus is not a matter of headcounting. As per our policy as explained in WP:DISCUSSCONSENSUS, consensus occurs "through discussion, using reasons based in policy, sources, and common sense". Per WP:DISCARD, the job of the closer is to "know policy sufficiently to know what arguments are to be excluded as irrelevant" [emphasis added] in the discussion.)

The "No" camp cited WP:POV and WP:NEWSORG to opine that this can only be added with solid, academic sourcing, not merely media reports. Simonm223 responded by citing three journal articles, before noting that gastrointestinal issues prevented him providing more citations, but assuring the editors that such citations were, in fact, abundant.

In surrebuttal, the "Yes" camp said even more sources were needed. Inferentially aggregating their replies, it seemed -- though didn't perfectly articulate -- they felt some level of overwhelming sourcing was necessary since it's unlikely to find sources that say X is not Y, but more likely to find sources that say X is Y.

If this were a vote, which it is not, the Oppose camp would have prevailed. As it is, however, based on the maxims laid-out at the start, there is no consensus to include "far-right" and no consensus to exclude "far-right" in the infobox. Our standard practice in these cases is to enforce the stable version of the article prior to the RfC until such time as a consensus emerges in the future. Chetsford (talk) 01:04, 20 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Should "far-right" be included as a faction ideology in the sidebar? Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 11:52, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've requested closure, for this RFC. GoodDay (talk) 19:49, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion (RfC: Should "Far-right" be mentioned as a minor ideology in the infobox)

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  • Third option The freedom caucus isn't so much the issue. However there should be mention of far-right as a Republican ideology because there is significant reliable sourcing of it. Examples:
  1. Donald Trump's Impact on the Republican Party by Michael Espinoza, Policy Studies, 01442872, Sep-Nov 2021, Vol. 42, Issue 5/6, Donald Trump has cast a lasting shadow on the Republican Party. His impact has been very influential on the party; and has triggered an overreliance on dishonesty as a means of debate (via paranoia and rage), which increased the socio-cultural appeal of embracing right-wing tendencies and has caused the party to become more openly hostile towards democracy as a way to gain/retain political power.
    The party has a choice to make. Will the post-Trump era be a time to refocus and move the GOP and Republican conservatism back towards a more inclusive approach like George W. Bush tried with compassionate conservatism – one that could appeal to Hispanics to a larger degree? Or, will the GOP double down and attempt to forge onward with an increasingly hostile and white minority driven approach that can work for them given the current framework of America democracy?
  2. The Koch Network and Republican Party Extremism by Theda Skocpol and Alexander Hertel-Fernandez, Perspectives on Politics Vol 14 Issue 3 Mann and Ornstein pointed out that even though the two parties did move symmetrically apart from the 1960s to the 1980s, since then continuing U.S. partisan polarization has mainly been driven by the unremitting rightward movement of the GOP. Tellingly, this far-right lunge has not slowed in the 2000s, not even during the presidency of self-declared “compassionate conservative” George W. Bush nor after Democrats won major electoral victories in 2006, 2008, and 2012.
  3. An International Far-Right Alliance? A Comparative Analysis of the Linkages Between the Republican Party and European Far-Right Parties by Guillem Colom, Social Science Research Network, Throughout the 2000s, political scholars evalauted the linkages between the Republican Party and European far-right parties regarding their ideological similarities. However, little has been examined on how the Republican Party and European far-right parties directly cooperate through political gatherings that enable them to establish common political agendas. To investigate far-right cooperation over time, I measured attendance of Republican and European far-right speakers at two prominent conservative gatherings, which were the Conservative Political Action Conference from 2013 to 2023 and National Conservatism Conference from 2016 to 2023.
  4. The Far-Right Threat in the United States: A European Perspective by Cas Mudde, American Academy of Political and Social Sciences, Volume 699, Issue 1 The article ends with some suggestions of how democrats (not just Democrats) should address the far-right Republican challenge to U.S. democracy.
  5. Only Yesterday: The Strange Odyssey of the Republican Party by Steve Fraser and Joshua B Freeman, New Labour Forum, Issue 22, Volume 1, Pages 94-97 This year's presidential election confirmed how strong a grip the far right has achieved over the Republican Party



There are many more such sources - Google Scholar returns 53,000 results for the search string republican party far-right and, from the first page, the majority are not false hits. Frankly the Freedom Caucus is irrelevant. It isn't so much a faction as it is a way of describing Republicans who want to "reveal their power level" so to speak. However the academic consensus appears to pretty strongly support that the Republican Party, at least as it was under Trump although some say this is pre-existing, is a far-right party. Simonm223 (talk) 16:13, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Why did you make this, @Simonm223:? - We already have all comments and #votes below. This will confuse readers into thinking this is the first post here. Toa Nidhiki05 20:13, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Because Nemov asked to separate out survey from discussion and it is standard format. If consensus is to proceed as we've carried on feel free to revert. Simonm223 (talk) 21:07, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    @Simonm223 there's no policy or guideline which states that survey and polling needs to be separated. TarnishedPathtalk 04:56, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • The Freedom Caucus is a significant faction in the Republican Party. The Freedom Caucus is typically considered far-right. Source 1 Source 2 Source 3 Source 4 Source 5 Source 6. Should "Far right" be listed as a minor ideology of the Republican Party on the article's infobox? Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 11:52, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    • Comment: I'd like to return to the suggested compromise. Using the footnotes section of the infobox as a method of improving the infobox's display of factions/caucuses and using that to display each of the factions'/caucuses' positions. i.e.
    footnotes = {{cnote|A|
    The Republican Governance Group is a faction described as fiscally conservative and centrist to center-right
    The Republican Main Street Partnership is considered to be a group of pragmatic conservatives and its political position is rarely defined
    The Republican Study Committee is the largest faction of the party, described as conservative and center-right to right-wing
    The Freedom Caucus is the faction formed most recently and is regarded as a right-wing populist and national conservative group on the right-wing to far-right of the political spectrum
    }}
    Goes without saying there would be sources to back up these claims and the wording is easily changeable if people prefer. I just believe it might be a good compromise, since we're not putting it in the position section, so there's no WP:DUE issue, but it still includes far-right.
    What do people think? – GlowstoneUnknown (Talk) 12:38, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I presume this would reduce the infobox display size? If so I'm on board. TarnishedPathtalk 12:43, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    In my mind, it could replace the Caucuses section and would just appear at the bottom of the infobox – GlowstoneUnknown (Talk) 12:45, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I think this is still an issue with essentially burying what is a significant detail of the contemporary Republican Party. The issue is that a huge number of the individuals and an entire caucus are unambiguously described as far right in the literature and on Wikipedia. The problem with any compromise that buries a mention of the far right is that is itself a massive WP:DUEWEIGHT issue, relegating a significant far-right portion of a major political party in a major global player to a single footnote and no mentions in the article isn't WP:NPOV, it's whitewashing. Given the abundance of sources describing individuals, factions, and caucuses within the modern Republican Party as far-right, relegating it to a footnote is absolutely getting deep into self-censoring territory, especially considering how loathe a lot of people here seem to be for any kind of mention, Wikipedia's standards for inclusion on factual claims be damned. Even if we relegate it to the footnote, we probably need to include it somewhere more prominently than that, at the very least in the Political positions entry. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 12:44, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Not everything needs to go into the infobox. So far I have been supporting putting far-right under the factions section for completeness and because RS supports it. Given the option of reducing the infobox I will support that. TarnishedPathtalk 12:49, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I'd be fine with reworking the infobox, but not simply memory-hole-ing any mention of the far-right in the article. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 13:10, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    GlowstoneUnknown's proposal is to make _ALL_ of the faction ideologies a footnote, not just far-right. TarnishedPathtalk 23:55, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    If it needs to be a footnote then it shouldn't be in the info box. Springee (talk) 23:59, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Given that the freedom caucus is far right, they should replace right wing with far right Zman19964 (talk) 20:22, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    "Given they are far right"? Far right of the GOP or next door to neo Nazis? Certainly they are the far right of the GOP but that doesn't mean they are next door to neo Nazis as our far right article would suggest. It would be far better to neutrally explain their policies etc rather than fixating on applying LABELS. Springee (talk) 22:17, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm definitely on-board with this—it shortens the infobox and avoids WP:DUE issues, since describing the Freedom Caucus specifically as having a meaningful far-right faction is correct. – Closed Limelike Curves (talk) 04:12, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support: As per reliable sources. But instead of being in the ideology section, it should be in the political position section EarthDude (talk) 18:36, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: There seemed to be a misunderstanding that there is a local consensus in the above RFC. Reading the threads currently on this page and some of the archive doesn't show a local consensus as much as arguments that it's discussed to death (which is true). Unless I'm missing an old discussion in the archive there is not a substantive and adjudicated reason why "far right" shouldn't be included in the article per WP:LOCALCONSENSUS. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 11:58, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose; RfC unnecessary - Please see the above threads. Only one active discussion-engaged user has expressed interest in adding this, while all others have rejected the idea, or called for a moratorium on changes. Toa Nidhiki05 01:22, 12 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    The above threads do not clearly articulate why it should be excluded. There are, however, a lot of threads of users saying “see the above threads” and the user being active in this thread isn’t really relevant, the reason we see so many users asking about this change is its inclusion is almost certainly WP:BLUESKY at this point. I've asked you, several times, to articulate what the substantive and specific points against the inclusion of “far right” are and you’ve only ever gone as far as to cast some shade at the authors for potential bias due to the organizations they work for or try to point at prior threads which didn’t contain discussions or conclusions, only blanket statements.
    as I said above:

    it's exclusion is frankly odd. In the above discussions it was never once articulated why it shouldn't be included. I think other editors are feeling that way too, or we wouldn't have this conversation coming up frequently from experienced editors, in contrast to the usual IP drive-by asking why some atomically controversial statement isn't included in the article. I think that what we're seeing with this editing pattern plus the calls for a moratorium feels like a WP:NPOV issue, even if unintentional.

    Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 07:36, 12 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Its exclusion is not odd, as academic sources do not widely or generally or even often refer to the party as far-right, which is typically associated with literal fascism or Nazism. Believe it or not, this has been discussed dozens of times - including several in the last few months - and editors have reached a consensus that academic sources broadly refer to the party as center-right or right-wing. Additional sources establish that centrists Republicans comprise a far larger share than the Freedom Caucus (which is, broadly, identified as right-wing or far-right, with the far-right faction being the minority) The fact that multiple editors have told you this at this point - and directed you to look at previous discussions on the matter - should give you a clear indication of our general exhaustion and frustration with repeatedly dealing with this debate. If you'd like, I can tag literally everyone involved in previous discussions on the material and they'll probably say the same thing.
    If you can't be bothered to look back yourself, here's recent archives with relevant discussions. here and here and here. Toa Nidhiki05 15:57, 12 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Except the RfC isn’t about labelling the party far right, it’s about naming it as a minor ideology, which you here acknowledge? I’m quite confused. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 16:14, 12 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Which is labeling the party as it. I'm not sure what you're talking about here, frankly. We already include the Freedom Caucus in a list of caucuses in the infobox. Toa Nidhiki05 16:19, 12 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Which is labeling the party as it
    Er, no? It’s labelling a faction of the party with that. Accuracy doesn’t need to be sacrificed to protect the article from what editors may possibly think if they skip context? This isn’t reasonable. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 18:16, 12 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    "Should "far-right" be included as a faction ideology in the sidebar?"
    You may want to reword this, as it implies two separate and distinct characterizations...A faction is not necessarily an ideology. I agree with others here that the appropriate categorization for "far-right" is as an ideology per Far-right politics. The MAGA movement is mentioned by sources as a faction that has shown far-right characteristics. DN (talk) 18:06, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Is this your original research that the far right is a minority in the freedom caucus since their elected leader, Andy Harris is himself described as far-right by various reliable sources? Theofunny (talk) 10:44, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Any WP:OR argument against inclusion rings hollow given that there are reliable sources, some of which are academic, which assign "far-right" as an ideology of the Freedom Caucus. TarnishedPathtalk 11:59, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Yes per the reliable sources given above by Warrenmck. The ideology of other factions of the party are already in the infobox and so it is reasonable that the ideology of the Freedom Caucus be listed also. That said I do have some concern that the infobox is too long and there should be discussion of ways to reduce its length. TarnishedPathtalk 09:19, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Notice how all of the current sources in the info box are academic? None of the ones proposed here are. The sources presented are comparatively low-quality, only barely going into detail or using “far-right” as a generic term (see also: using “far left” to describe progressive Democrats). The Freedom Caucus is already covered by “right-wing populism”.Toa Nidhiki05 11:11, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    @Warrenmck do you have any academic sources from subject matter experts which support Far-right? TarnishedPathtalk 11:50, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I just provided one, but WP:RS doesn't require them and inventing new standards around sourcing should be done through the Village Pump rather than a talk page for a random article, no? Especially when those standards cause Wikipedia to be less accurate. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 12:24, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    "Academic sources are better than news media" has long been understood in Wikipedia (see e.g. WP:TIERS). More importantly, though, Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy. We don't need to go through a rigamarole of magical incantations at the Village Pump just to realize we should trust peer-reviewed scientific journals over the media when the two disagree. – Closed Limelike Curves (talk) 22:01, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Except they agree. There’s a standard being set here for far-right that isn’t being held for other details included in the article. The arguments against are mostly disparate and disjointed calls for either a new specific standard or WP:OR, which tells me that the arguments against including it aren’t necessarily all coming from Wikipedia’s own policies and norms. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 06:17, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    "Right-wing populism" and "Far right" are not synonymous. Progressive democrats aren't far left for the most part, except by false equivalency. You yourself made an argument that it's an accurate description of a segment of the Republican party and your explicit reason for its exclusion runs pretty directly counter to how Wikipedia works. We're not going to whitewash this article for fear that readers could accidentally map a minor ideology to the entire party.
    But regardless, if we're inventing new sourcing standards (and to answer @TarnishedPath):
    From The Original Split in America:

    "The Freedom Caucus and the Tea Party anchor the far-right end of the political spectrum along with Fox News."

    Allcorn, Seth; Stein, Howard F.  The Journal of Psychohistory; New York Vol. 49, Iss. 2, (Fall 2021): 82-100.
    Which really shouldn't have been necessary given the abundance of clearly reliable sources above. There isn't a requirement that only academic sources can count here, and in fact WP:SECONDARYSOURCES makes that a bit more challenging to justify as policy here. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 12:17, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • It’s not an arbitrary standard. I could find an abundance of medium-quality news sources that refer to “far-left” Democrats, but that doesn’t mean there is a faction of Democrats that are in the political far-left. Terms like this are often used fast and loose to refer to the extreme ends of a party’s internal coalitions - like how a “liberal Republican” or a “conservative Democrat”, in modern terms, is not affiliated with the left or the right. Toa Nidhiki05 13:04, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    It's an arbitrary standard because you're unilaterally imposing extra caveats on the rules around sourcing. I could find an abundance of medium-quality news sources that refer to “far-left” Democrats If the same sourcing standards can be met, then it should be included. Tu quoque isn't a valid concern here, because what's being discussed is this article's inclusion of the term. If you think Democratic party should include far left as a factional ideology then by all means, be the change you want to see. I suspect the "medium" in "medium quality" is going to have WP:RS issues, considering there's objectively no far left bloc with power among the Democrats in contrast to the far right with the Republicans. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 13:10, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • It is not arbitrary to preference high-quality, academic sources from subject matter experts. This is normal practice on Wikipedia, and you are fundamentally wrong about this. And your proposal is fundamentally not accurate either - “far right” is a political position, not an ideology.
  • I don’t support adding far-left as a faction. However, it’s objectively false to say there arent’t powerful far-left Democrats - see the Squad, which has more members than there were votes to remove McCarthy, the Progressive Caucus, the left-wing, largest Democratic faction. Toa Nidhiki05 13:22, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    “far right” is a political position, not an ideology.
    "Far-right" is literally a term that refers to a range of ideologies, which is routinely used to describe the Freedom Caucus. That the ideology is not a single, unitary thing, doesn't mean it's not an ideology, just as "conservatism" isn't or indeed practically any ideology. I don't think you'll find many political theorists agreeing with your WP:OR take there.
    it’s objectively false to say there arent’t powerful far-left Democrats - see the Squad
    I'm not sure you're familiar with what "far left" means, respectfully. And we should leave this discussion out of it, it has no baring on the proposed changes to this article. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 13:42, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think you're the one who doesn't understand what you're proposing. Newsweek, POLITICO, the New York Times, International Business Times, Northeastern, and CNN have all referred to them as far-left. We don't include "far-left" as a faction there because 1) it's not a faction and 2) academic sources do not regard the Democratic Party as being or having a substantial far-left faction, even if the term is used to identify the furthest-left members of the party. This distinction is extremely relevant here. Toa Nidhiki05 14:15, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm not going to keep engaging on questions relating to the Democrats. This isn't a political discussion, it's a discussion around the accuracy of information in an article. Reliable, academic sources consider the Freedom Caucus to be far right. Even if we accept the modification of WP:RS to account for that specific standard. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 14:23, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Adding to my !vote above, there has also been additional sources provided by Cortador which support the change. As long as the ideology of other factions is addressed in the infobox, so should be the ideology of that portion of the Republican party which is far-right. TarnishedPathtalk 07:22, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Extended content
  • Complimentary bar plots made by me, showing that if you just knew what percentage of adults had a Bachelor's degree in each state, you would almost certainly know who won each state. The only exception for Harris was New Mexico, and the only exceptions for Trump were Utah, Pennsylvania, Kansas, and North Carolina.
    Bar plot of the percentage of the population with a BA or higher in the states won by Donald Trump in the 2024 United States presidential election.
    Bar plot of the percentage of the population of the electoral jurisdictions won by Kamala Harris in the 2024 United States presidential election.
    JohnAdams1800 (talk) 16:37, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
To me at least, the footnote idea is somewhat problematic, if only because I think it's too much explanation. I wouldn't mind using that section to clarify factions though (ie. which caucuses in the House are which ideology.). That would probably be more useful than the current somewhat arbitrary list of "factions". Something like:

Sources identify the Republican Main Street Caucus as centrist,[1] the Republican Governance Group as center[2] to center-right,[3] the Republican Study Committee as center-right[4] to right-wing,[5] and the Freedom Caucus as Right-wing[6] to far-right[7]

I'd prefer not to use news sources, but individual caucuses are generally not as focused on in academic sources.
Toa Nidhiki05 15:09, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This looks viable. DN (talk) 00:36, 18 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Just as a comment, @Toa Nidhiki05, your use of inline sourcing broke the talk page, you may want to refactor those into links. We have academic sources now for “far-right”, how do you feel about the suggestion above to include it in the position section instead of the ideology one? Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 15:27, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I oppose including it in the position section. Toa Nidhiki05 15:29, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
So we have sources that meet the standards you outlined before. Would you be in favour of adding it to the ideology section then? What is your preferred handling of the whole far-right thing here, since you’ve not been terribly clear what you want, rather than don’t want. The citations are still disabling the “reply” button and burying these replies, by the way.Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 15:37, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I am not in favor of adding it to either; "far-right" is not an ideology, and as previous discussions have agreed to, the majority of academic sources refer to the party as either center-right or right-wing, and so that is what we label the party as. As far as I can tell, there has been no shift in academia within the last 3-6 months towards labeling the party any differently. Toa Nidhiki05 15:47, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
the majority of academic sources refer to the party as either center-right or right-wing
This is not, and it has never been, what the RFC is about. Nobody at any point here has asked for the party to be labeled far-right. If your explicit concern is that it being included at all, regardless of what sources say, results in labeling the party as it then I'm struggling to see how that fits into Wikipedia's framework and guidelines. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 16:29, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That was a typo above, fwiw.
But yes, I oppose including it at all. It's not the prevailing academic view. Unless you can demonstrate this has changed in the last 3-6 months. Toa Nidhiki05 16:37, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Toa Nidhiki05 Can you keep in mind that Trump's main support is from voters without college degrees, and academic sources are written by people with college degrees. Also as Wikipedia editors, we almost all have college degrees too, and thus perceive Trump and the GOP as further to the right than the median American voter. It's Actor–observer asymmetry, which is a key part of statistics in the first place. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 16:42, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This is WP:OR and not particularly helpful here. It's also worth remembering that not everyone in this thread is American or on the political left. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 16:43, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
But is everyone in this thread college-educated? Because if they are, they are statistically less likely to vote for Trump, are more likely to perceive Trump as too far on the right, and are less likely to be appealed to him ideologically because education appears to be the ideological divider now, not income. Sources: Polarized by Degrees by Matt Grossmann and David A. Hopkins; Can Democrats Win Back the White Working Class?; What Explains Educational Realignment Among White Americans? JohnAdams1800 (talk) 16:45, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Please see WP:NOTFORUM. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 16:50, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I’m not sure how attempting to control discussion here is a good idea. Toa Nidhiki05 17:12, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Because sidebars about electorate educational attainment are unrelated to the discussion here, and the user above already inserted a bunch of WP:OR bar charts into the discussion about something unrelated that broke the formatting of the page. It’s not trying to “control the discussion” to point out that this RfC isn’t the appropriate venue for these analyses of the electorate and conversations around implicit bias. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 17:18, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Far-right isnt an ideology. Its a broad grouping of ideology. Putting it in the ideology section makes absolutely no sense. It should be put in the political position section of the infobox EarthDude (talk) 20:00, 6 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose We need some more solid, academic sources that describe a far-right faction. Adding a far-right faction to the sidebar would require us to add a far-right faction in the factions section in the body of the article below. The right-wing populist faction already notes that it is "described as the American political variant of the far-right". I don't think we need another far-right faction without some more solid sourcing. BootsED (talk) 17:35, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    What do we use as a benchmark for far-right politics in the first place? We can certainly do so for individual politicians or say the Freedom Caucus. When judging on the political spectrum, we largely use the standards of the country and RS.
    I've written plenty about the section about right-wing populism, and there are some sources on how some Republican populists are far-right. But I haven't encountered any sources saying that the Republican Party is far-right or that far-right politics is a minor ideology of the party.
    I regularly read books, academic sources, and reputable newspapers--I've added plenty of sources to the article. I just haven't encountered any sources saying the party is far-right as part of its ideology. Regardless of our personal political views, the party's positions are clearly not far-right to the national electorate.
    Note: I voted for Harris, and largely agree with the Democratic Party's views. I'm just using statistics and the sources I've added, not my personal political views. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 20:30, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    The Freedom Caucus is consistently described as right-wing to far-right. There not much to debate there. Cheers. DN (talk) 00:28, 18 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose (Summoned by bot) Having given some thought to this, I'm going to by-pass many questions to answer what I deem the central one in this case, which is "is the infobox the place to characterise (all?) the groups within a political party?". My answer is no. Infoboxes of political parties already end up overburdened with detail and this one seems at present about right to summarise broad trends in the party. If the Freedom Caucus is now a significant distinct faction, its name could be added to, or preferably replace one of the other named factions of the party. The infobox should provide a quick handy 'key facts'. Coverage of the caucus, and how the caucus impacts the whole party can be covered better in text in the normal way and with due weight. btw I'm European, and some of Harris's positions were relatively 'far-right' seen from here.Pincrete (talk) 06:24, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    This is some of my thinking. The infobox at present contains ideologies of the factions and I wrote above that the infobox is too long and ways should be explored to shorten it. One of those ways would be to remove the faction ideologies altogether. However given that the infobox does contain faction ideologies, in the absense of discussion about removing them altogether I think I'd have to support listing all faction ideologies. Agree on both major US parties looking fairly hard-right from over in Australia. Both parties are a unity ticket on perpetual war and unrestrained capitalism. The Democrats only fiddle around the edges with individualism which by and large is not a socialist or anarchist concern (actual left-wing politics). TarnishedPathtalk 07:13, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Just as a quick note @Pincrete: - the Freedom Caucus is already listed in the "Caucuses" section of the infobox. So not including "far-right" doesn't mean the Freedom Caucus is not listed - it already is. It is, contrary to popular belief, the smallest of the GOP's major caucuses (the centrist Republican Main Street Caucus and Republican Governance Group have nearly double the members). And political scientists routinely regard the GOP as either center-right or right-wing, even relative to Europe (which doesn't matter here - political positions are a national scale, not an international one, and both parties are the big-tents of either side of the aisle). Toa Nidhiki05 13:51, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    TN05, thanks for the correction. I only scanned down as far as the 'ideologies' where three primary ideological positions were listed. I didn't see factions. Obviously we should be consistent with regard to the various 'wings' of a party, but IMO, as a general principle, listing ideologies and factions and 'positions on the L-R spectrum' is overburdening the infobox, to a large extent these overlap. Obviously I agree that L-R can only be assessed within a particular country, my remark was simply an 'aside'. Pincrete (talk) 14:06, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Just because left-leaning polities in America have sometimes labeled the party as such, doesn't mean it's true. We must be careful as the party represents the views of millions of Americans and actively participates in our democratic process. Labeling the Republican Party "far-right" would be as preposterous as labeling the Democratic Party "far-left". I might remind everyone here that Wikipedia has a carefully crafted list of "reliable sources" that are selected specifically to reinforce specific viewpoints that to the unaware wikipedia reader give false and/or unreliable information that will be taken at face value. It's sort of an information war. If it is far-right, we must first define far-right, then research and conclude if the party is far right or not, and then find the scholarly sources that support that designation. We must not rely on opinionated legacy media to give us an answer which unfortunately a large portion of Wikipedia does. We must be extremely neutral and unbiased in our labeling, and for that reason I strongly oppose that label. Completely Random Guy (talk) 15:24, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    We can ignore all of that and describe the party as sources do. Wikipedia has no obligation to pander to American voters, and should in fact avoid doing so.
    Likewise, suggesting "we must first define far-right, then research and conclude if the party is far right or not" is textbook original research and we should avoid it at all cost. Cortador (talk) 15:31, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    It is totally incorrect to say that "labeling the Republican Party "far-right" would be as preposterous as labeling the Democratic Party "far-left"". For one, it is easy to find senior figures and organizations in the Republican Party that are associated with politics that meet the standard definition of far-right; that absolutely does not apply to the Democrats.
    Second, there's a very simple litmus test here. Do people and groups that are unambiguously far-right or far-left support one of the major parties? On the far-right, groups that are explicitly fascist, Nazi, white supremacist, or Christian nationalist pretty much uniformly are supportive of the Republican Party and/or actively engaged with Republican politics. On the far-left, groups that are communist, Marxist, or anarchist, are nearly always outside of the Democratic Party, and critical of centre-left (and sometimes left-wing) social democrats and democratic socialists who might argue for working within the Democratic Party. ChristyMcMorrow (talk) 17:50, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    This isnt just left leaning politics defining the party as far-right. We have lots and lots of extremely credible and reliable academic and scholarly sources at this point which state the Republican Party to be far-right. None such sources state the Dems to be far-left. You're engaging in false equivalence here EarthDude (talk) 20:02, 6 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I don't think any of what you said made any sense. I will try to avoid insult but your post has a lot of contempt for core Wikipedia principles.I will respond by block quoting you in italics, with my response in plain text.
    Just because left-leaning polities in America have sometimes labeled the party as such, doesn't mean it's true. We must be careful as the party represents the views of millions of Americans and actively participates in our democratic process.
    Educated analysis often gets smeared as "left leaning," but Wikipedia's job is to convey information as accurately as possible through consensus - not appeal to American voters. If the preponderance of reliable sources find that the GOP is far-right, that's what it is. If we reach consensus for that designation, and millions of Americans are offended by that designation - sorry for my crudeness - tough shit. Wikipedia strives for least offensive - not "never offensive to anyone ever."
    Labeling the Republican Party "far-right" would be as preposterous as labeling the Democratic Party "far-left".
    False equivalence. We don't achieve consensus like this. If there are plenty of academic sources describing the Democratic Party, so be it. If people are offended by a designation that is placed based on the literature - too bad for them. They can raise other objections if they have them.
    I might remind everyone here that Wikipedia has a carefully crafted list of "reliable sources" that are selected specifically to reinforce specific viewpoints that to the unaware wikipedia reader give false and/or unreliable information that will be taken at face value.
    WP:SOAPBOX. Take this smear campaign elsewhere. There's no conspiracy to tilt Wikipedia in a particular direction, and the reliable sources are labeled that way through consensus. I am sorry you feel differently.
    If it is far-right, we must first define far-right, then research and conclude if the party is far right or not, and then find the scholarly sources that support that designation.
    We do not have to do that. Wikipedia is not a community sourced dictionary - we follow reliable sources. Crafting a definition on the fly then finding sources to match is original research. We don't do that.
    We must not rely on opinionated legacy media to give us an answer which unfortunately a large portion of Wikipedia does. We must be extremely neutral and unbiased in our labeling, and for that reason I strongly oppose that label.
    You are soapboxing again. Slandering reliable sources as "opinionated legacy media" is an interesting tack - but not backed by any policy.
    You have a warped understanding of NPOV, a fundamental principle of Wikipedia. Please take the time to read over them again. You seem to be confusing "a neutral point of view" with "not offending anyone ever, especially Republicans." Carlp941 (talk) 21:57, 6 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • No, adding "far-right" is WP:UNDUE entirely. Should we start an RfC to mention far-left as a minor ideology in the infobox of the Democratic Party (United States)? Iljhgtn (talk) 21:33, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    If you think that the Democratic party article should include far left as a faction and it is backed by reliable sources then by all means, you should try to include it. Theofunny (talk) 11:08, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose — Per BootsED, who articulated my beliefs concisely. The provided sourcing is acceptable, but in order to include such a grand statement in the infobox, more association between the Republican Party and the far-right is necessary, let alone if the Freedom Caucus' existence can constitute a proper Republican faction with a hold in the internal operation of the party. elijahpepe@wikipedia (he/him) 22:32, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    The Freedom Caucus has 33 elected members of Congress, of course they’re a meaningful faction. It’s not a “grand statement” if the sourcing is acceptable. There’s a reason that there are explicit arguments being made in here by editors concerned with sanitizing the reputation of the Republican Party (this isn’t an accusation, it’s been an explicit argument made in opposing the changes in here so far) and another entire subset of editors can’t help but discuss the article on Democrats: because a subset of editors is openly concerned with “far right” seeming inflammatory regardless of what WP:RS say and are making the mistake of viewing this as a political discussion, and Wikipedia shouldn’t self-censor. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 06:34, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    This exactly. Additionally, a number of editors are proposing that we conduct original research to determine whether or not the GOP has a far-right faction instead of simply assessing whether or not there are sufficient sources that state that they do. Cortador (talk) 07:13, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    If you think the sourcing is acceptable but want to omit the information anyway, you are coming to a conclusion that the sources didn't come to i.e. you are conducting original research. Cortador (talk) 09:26, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. WP:UNDUE and no highly-reliable academic sources are provided, as would be needed for a highly-controversial label like this. – Closed Limelike Curves (talk) 22:11, 14 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Original comment moved to survey section above. Simonm223 (talk) 19:59, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

We really need sources that show this is a consensus view, not just a view that some argue for. The difficulty with a topic with as much coverage as this one is trying to decide what counts as a consensus view vs a view a source subscribes to or is advocating to be true. An additional problem is that "far-right" is not well defined. In an earlier discussion a source was offered to support something "far-right". When looking at the actual text it was clear that the source was referring to the far-right of the GOP. Thinking of this as a venn diagram, what our far-right article calls far right and those who are the furthest right of the elected GOP members aren't the same. "Far-right" is an inherently vague term so we need to be careful when we imply that sources that use the term to refer to members/parts of the GOP are intending to lump those people in with Neo-Nazis etc. Additionally, if those sources are we should question if their claims are valid. Unfortunately we are going through a partisan political period. We need to be careful that we are really reflecting a NPOV take vs we are listening to the partisan sources trying to make their cases. If nothing else we need true historical hindsight to see what claims really come true. Springee (talk) 16:41, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I mean a lot of these articles actually do lump the Republicans in with neo nazis. Or the "alt-right" anyway. And, for those citations I provided, I provided quotes so that you can see precisely how they are calling the republicans far-right. I also provided links to the articles. I'm only one man and have neither the time nor inclination to read fifty-three-thousand journal articles just to justify your arbitrarily high standard for inclusion. These are best sources. Please feel free to demonstrate that these positions are contested. If you cannot do so then I'd say "the republican party is far-right" should go in the lede. Simonm223 (talk) 16:46, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Any source that is honestly trying to associate the GOP with neo nazis is going to be a wp:REDFLAG and should be discounted absent some serious support from a wide range of other sources. I appreciate the issue with trying to read, as you said, 53,000 articles. However, that actually is part of the problem. How do we know what represents a consensus among those 53,000 articles (and other sources that could apply here). This is why we really need good summary sources to make such claims. At the same time, thanks to key word searching etc, we have 53,000 sources that will make a huge range of claims, many that will not stand the test of time or will not be widely accepted. How do you know the sources you are picking don't fall into that camp? It's not an easy problem but it does suggest that, as an encyclopedia, one that is supposed to be both neutral and impartial, and not a political journal where scholars need to put forth the next idea that will help them get published (and grant money), that we need to be err on the side of caution with such claims. Springee (talk) 16:54, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Again, I am citing peer reviewed sources here. They're right above. Please feel free to review them rather than declaring them unreliable unread just because their findings make you uncomfortable. Simonm223 (talk) 16:57, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not questioning that they are peer reviewed. As you just said, there are 53,000 articles so how do we know which of the peer reviewed ones are the good ones and the ones that represent a consensus vs the ones just making a new argument. While peer review is a step in the right direction, it's not a talisman that ensures the claims related to politics are true, will never be challenged etc. When we have so much information we should resort to summary sources to help us sort what has staying power from things that don't. Springee (talk) 17:16, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Suggesting an editor needs to read 53,000 sources before we can put far-right in an infobox is WP:CPUSH pretty unambiguously. Simonm223 (talk) 17:20, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not suggesting that. I'm acknowledging the number you provided (presumably a rhetorical number but useful for argument sake). When we have so, so many sources how do we decide which ones to use, not use? I'm arguing that we need to find those that are summary sources, the sources that have a zoomed out view, rather than those that argue things are changing and we need to follow that lead. As I've said in the past, Wikipedia shouldn't present new ideas, views as fact. When we include such ideas we acknowledge they are new or not established. That is the case here. It would be wrong to avoid including the view that the party is now more populist than conservative. It would be wrong to avoid any inclusion of the claim that parts of the party are "far-right". However, we need to treat those as claims put forth rather than as agreed facts. Springee (talk) 17:36, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There are literally 53000 references to review on Google Scholar regarding the Republican party and its relationship to the far-right. I was not using hyperbole that's literally what my search string returned. I went through the first page, sticking only to peer reviewed media, and there was like... one? false positive on the list. The rest directly addressed the relationship with the far-right. There was some variability. Some said that Trump was pushing the Republicans far-right. Some suggested this was an acceleration of a process that began in the 1980s but that the Rs had been moving farther and farther right over a very extensive and consistent time period. There was some disagreement over whether Bush's "compassionate conservativism" had slowed the roll. Of two mentions one said it had slowed the far-right acceleration the other said it did not. Others pointed to Koch funding as beginning a far-right shift. But the one thing that they all agreed with is that there were ideological connections between the Republican party and the far right. Simonm223 (talk) 20:28, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Based on what you are saying there are 53000 key word hits that have both phrases (or similar) within the article/source. That isn't the same as saying they are the same. Just for reference, doing a Google scholar search for "Republican far-left" resulted in 29,000 hits. I don't think we would argue that the GOP is far-left. Springee (talk) 23:31, 20 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes but you are leaving off part of what I said here - which is that I went through the peer reviewed articles on the first page and had only one that was a false hit. Simonm223 (talk) 12:24, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure those (the ones at the top of this string) price what you are hoping to prove. Springee (talk) 14:49, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Well good thing it's an all you can eat buffet of various academics calling the Republican party politically extreme.
  1. Rise of the Reactionaries: The American Far Right and U.S. Foreign Policy By: Rehman, Iskander, Washington Quarterly, 0163660X, Oct2017, Vol. 40, Issue 4 Public opinion polling also appears to show that, by and large, the American populace remains profoundly committed to internationalism and to living within an open democratic society.[80] That said, on closer examination it also reveals some troubling trendlines, particularly among Republican voters. For example, it has become apparent that now close to 32 percent of Republican voters have a positive image of Vladimir Putin, while during the election 62 percent (compared with 47 percent of Democrats) stated that they favored "letting other countries deal with their own problems."[81] An October 2016 poll also indicated that more and more Americans—across the political spectrum—are skeptical of global economic engagement.[82]
    It is around these issues that the future of the Republican Party's foreign policy will be decided. With a man of the far right occupying the highest office in the land, internationalist conservatives will have their work cut out for them. As one historical overview of Republican foreign policy has noted, "Presidents have acted as focal points for their party, and Republican presidents have been given remarkable leeway to redefine not only conservative foreign policies but what it means to be a conservative in the United States."[83]     This one is interesting because it's an older one. It establishes that Trump was being called reactionary and far-right from the outset, and that academics saw a Republican party capitulation to Trumpism as being far-right, should it occur. Of course, as a plethora of reliable sources demonstrate, that did, in fact, occur. Simonm223 (talk) 19:01, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  2. The Far Right Today (book) By Cass Mudde, published by Wiley, 2019, Ch. 10: Twelve Theses on the Fourth Wave, Subsection: Populist Radical Right Politics Is No Longer Limited to Populist Radical Right Parties, In the US, (neo)conservatives in the Repubican Party, including Texas senator Ted Cruz, were parroting far-right conspiracy theories about the UN (and the alleged "New World Order") well before President Trump brought them into the White House.
    But Decades of authoritarian and nativist responses to jihadist terrorist attacks, as well as the so-called "refugee crisis" of 2015 have led to a change not just in discourse, but also in policies... while a majority of Republican governors in the US supported a "Muslim ban."
  3. How Far-Right Extremism Changed American Body Politic By Nacos, Brigitte and Bloch-Elkon, Yaeli, Political Science Quarterly (Oxford University Press / USA). Fall2024, Vol. 139 Issue 3, p387-406. 20p. Modern-day, violent, far-right extremism existed well before Trump entered the political arena as presidential candidate in mid-2015. But during his first campaign, his first presidency, and after he left office, hate speech and violent extremism of the far-right variety moved from the fringe to the political mainstream, as the glorification of the January 6 insurrectionists by the former and aspiring future U.S. president; elected GOP officials in local, state, and federal bodies; and millions of MAGA loyalists attested to. and Three decades later, Trump stood on what remained of the violent far-right's sacred ground and spoke in the same tongue as McVeigh and contemporary extremists. He depicted himself and his supporters as victims of an America-hating deep state, proclaimed that 2024 would be “the final battle,” and promised to make America free again “if you put me back into the White House.”
    For Jeffrey Toobin, who studied McVeigh and the modern roots of right-wing extremism, “[A]ll trends that McVeigh embodied—the political extremism, the obsession with gun rights, the search for like-minded allies, and above all the embrace of violence—came together under the forty-fifth president [Trump].”8 However, the revival of far-right extremism in the 21st century began actually after the election of the first Black U.S. president, Barack Obama, and intensified after Donald Trump's jump into the political arena. It was fostered by the same radical ideas of white supremacy, neo-Nazism, and white Christian nationalism that incited far-right radicals in the 1980s and 1990s, including McVeigh.     and very, very explicitly and overtly To assess whether Trump would be able to act on his repeated threats to jail his political opponent once back in the Oval Office, we consulted and found disconcerting answers in the comprehensive Heritage Foundation's “Project 2025: Presidential Transition Project.”1 The sole focus here is on the aggressive rhetoric and violence of far-right extremism directly associated with the Tea Party and later with a Republican president and his party. Let's repeat for emphasis: The sole focus here is on the aggressive rhetoric and violence of far-right extremism directly associated with the Tea Party and later with a Republican president and his party. The article continues Racial prejudices found a home in the Tea Party, which was established just a few weeks after Obama's inauguration; in the Tea Party's quasi-militant arm, the heavily armed and militarily trained Oath Keepers; and, most of all, in anti-Obama conspiracy theorists.
    I'm going to stop now except for one last pull quote from this very explicit and thorough article, now from the conclusion: It is no a secret that Donald Trump admires strongmen, such as Russia's Vladimir Putin, North Korea's Kim Jong Un, Turkey's Tayyip Erdogan, and Hungary's Viktor Orban; he has praised these men often and publicly. Although Trump said repeatedly that he wanted to be a dictator only on the first day of his second presidency, there was no outcry by the political class, business leaders, or the public at large. Instead, 76 percent of Republicans, 36 percent of Independents, and 13 percent of Democrats told pollsters that a Trumpian 1-day dictatorship was definitely or probably a good idea.66 Even the most extreme threats issued by Trumps, his inner circle, and fanatical followers of his Truth Social posts considered this behavior as normal. The same was true for several Wall Street billionaires, who donated generously to Trump's 2016 campaign, disavowed him after 6 January, and renewed their support in 2024, if only to avoid new taxes on the wealthiest individuals, one of Biden's campaign promises. They and an increasing number of Silicon Valley billionaires followed the example of almost all GOP officials in Washington, DC, and around the country who had been critical of Trump after he incited the breach the U.S. Capitol; they all crawled back into the fold.
    In the epilogue of his book How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them, Jason Stanley concludes,
    What normalization does is transform the morally extraordinary into the ordinary. It makes us able to tolerate what was once intolerable by making it seem as if this is the way things have always been…Normalization means precisely that encroaching ideologically extreme conditions are not recognized as such because they have come to seem normal.67    .
    I'm reaching the limit of how many "the Republican party are far-right" journal articles I can stomach in a day now. I think, from my momentary source confusion earlier today, that it's clear they're kind of starting to blur together with the sheer number I've read in the last two days so I'm going to leave it here for now. But I guess the question is this: when is enough enough? How many peer-reviewed sources calling the republicans far right, extremist, authoritarian, racist, etc. do we need before we can do away with the absurd notion that the Republicans can be treated as a center-right party? Simonm223 (talk) 19:01, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Y'all mind taking this to a discussion section? It took me three times to leave a simple survey comment. If no one object I'm going to collapse this so it's easier to leave a comment. Nemov (talk) 19:24, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    No I object strongly. This is the discussion section. No section was established for !votes. Simonm223 (talk) 19:26, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    So, it's not that it doesn't include center-right, it's that it also includes far-right according to those RS, and whether or not DUE, Neutral etc...
    I've tried to paraphrase most of the recent arguments against inclusion below, to help us keep track. Forgive me if I missed any, or mistakenly misconstrued any context, I'm only trying to help keep things organized.
    By all means feel free to mention any needed corrections or amendments the list...
    1. POV/Claim
    2. Wikipedia shouldn't present new ideas, views as fact
    3. lacking good summary sources
    4. HFC is not just far-right
    5. WP:UNDUE/Needs academic sources
    6. more association (than just the HFC) between the Republican Party and the far-right is necessary
    7. left-leaning polities in America have sometimes labeled the party as such, doesn't mean it's true
    8. Wiki should not rely on opinionated legacy media
    9. The info-box may not be the place to characterize the groups within a political party
    10. political scientists routinely regard the GOP as either center-right or right-wing
    11. The right-wing populist faction already notes that it is "described as the American political variant of the far-right"
    12. the majority of academic sources refer to the party as either center-right or right-wing. It's not the prevailing academic view.
    13. far-right has been rejected in numerous/previous discussions
    Cheers. DN (talk) 11:09, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    This has been one of the things that's stood out to me the most. The support arguments are all using similar logic and rhetoric, and the oppose arguments are all over the map in terms of why. Per WP:CONSENSUS:

    Many of these discussions will involve polls of one sort or another; but as consensus is determined by the quality of arguments (not by a simple counted majority), polls should be regarded as structured discussions rather than voting. Responses indicating individual explanations of positions using Wikipedia policies and guidelines are given the highest weight.

    Also, you're missing "too close to a change of presidents" on the list. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 11:19, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Completely Random Guy also brought up that the addition shouldn't be made because the GOP got a lot of votes during the election. Note that I don't think this is a valid argument in any way, shape, or form, but it was made. Cortador (talk) 11:50, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    @JohnAdams1800 also made the argument that since the GOP got elected by the majority of the populace, it isn't far right. Theofunny (talk) 14:19, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    The main issue is that academic sources haven't described the GOP as a whole as far-right, and its electoral results show that it ideologically appeals to about half the country. Regardless of our personal political views (I voted for Harris), the RS and electoral results show the GOP's ideological positions aren't far-right. There are certainly some far-right GOP politicians, with their own RS for that.
    Note: Trump won 49.8% of voters in 2024, go figure on barely not winning a majority. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 17:06, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    We are not suggesting that the GOP as a whole is far-right, just that like a notable center right faction, there is a far right faction too. Theofunny (talk) 17:47, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Reliable sources don't indicate the center-right is a faction. It, along with right-wing, represent the core position of the party. A better comparison would be centrism; centrist caucuses actually far outnumber the Freedom Caucus, too. Toa Nidhiki05 18:12, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I should have written a part of their ideology is far-right according to other publications. Theofunny (talk) 18:25, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Even if this isn't the intention, jamming stuff like this into the infobox just seems like POV pushing. This is especially the case after an election and inauguration of a new president. Nemov (talk) 19:22, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
extended discussion
Furthermore, there are several academic sources which describe the Republican party under Trump as a far-right party.[10][11] Shadowwarrior8 (talk) 21:20, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Coded implementation
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
  • @Warrenmck can you give an example of how the infobox would look with your proposed change? At present the infobox on this article is quite long and I am interested how you would implement the change. TarnishedPathtalk 08:23, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    This is the entire change I’m proposing, ordering is just alphabetical:
    *:| ideology         = 
*:{{unbulleted list|class=nowrap|
*: | '''Majority:'''
*: | [[Conservatism in the United States|Conservatism]]
*: | [[Right-wing populism]]
*:}}
*:'''[[Factions in the Republican Party (United States)|Factions]]:'''{{unbulleted list|class=nowrap|
*: | [[Centrism#United States|Centrism]]
*: | [[Christian right]]
*: | [[Far-right]]
*: | [[Libertarian Republican|Libertarianism]]
*:}}
*:
    Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 08:46, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I can't be arsed going through the code, so it would just be adding a single point for Far-right in the unbulleted list? TarnishedPathtalk 09:06, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    With a citation, yes. The only change in the above code from whats there now is the addition of “Far right” in the bulleted list and that’s the total content of what the RfC is about. Hence me saying this seems like a WP:BLUESKY issue. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 09:09, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

References

  1. ^ Pengelly, Martin; Greve, Joan E. (October 4, 2023). "Republicans Jim Jordan and Steve Scalise launch House speakership bids". The Guardian.
  2. ^ "Three Minor Parties Merge Ahead of April Elections". The Hill. November 7, 2007. Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.), a longtime member and former co-chairman of the Tuesday Group, said lawmakers launched the PAC to help vulnerable centrists as well as liberal-leaning Republicans running for open congressional seats.
  3. ^ Kapur, Sahil (July 18, 2023). "Centrist Republicans warn far-right tactics could backfire in funding fight". NBC News. Retrieved January 11, 2024.
  4. ^ Stening, Tanner (June 5, 2023). "Is the US now a four-party system? Progressives split Democrats, and far-right divides Republicans". Northeastern Global News. Retrieved May 29, 2024.
  5. ^ Clarke, Andrew J. (July 2020). "Party Sub-Brands and American Party Factions". American Journal of Political Science. 64 (3): 9. doi:10.1111/ajps.12504.
  6. ^ Lizza, Ryan (December 7, 2015). "A House divided". The New Yorker. Retrieved April 10, 2017. Meadows is one of the more active members of the House Freedom Caucus, an invitation-only group of about forty right-wing conservatives that formed at the beginning of this year.
  7. ^ Wong, Scott; Allen, Jonathan (April 28, 2022). "Trump expected to stump for Illinois congresswoman in primary fight against fellow lawmaker". NBC News. Retrieved November 24, 2022. Rep. Mary Miller, a member of the far-right Freedom Caucus, said Trump has vowed to campaign for her ahead of her primary against GOP Rep. Rodney Davis.
  8. ^ Ball, Molly (January 23, 2024). "The GOP Wants Pure, Uncut Trumpism". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on January 24, 2024. Retrieved February 22, 2024.
  9. ^ Eisler, Parker, Peter, Ned (16 August 2024). "How Trump's intimidation tactics have reshaped the Republican Party". Reuters.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  10. ^ Kreitler, Olson, Melanie, Greta (ed.). Diversity Issues in the USA. Giessen, Germany: transcript Verlag. pp. 241, 247. ISBN 978-3-8376-7473-6.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: editors list (link)
  11. ^ L. Nacos, Y. Shapiro, Bloch-Elkon, Brigitte, Robert, Yaeli (2024). Hate Speech and Political Violence: Far-Right Rhetoric from the Tea Party to the Insurrection. New York, USA: Columbia University Press. ISBN 9780231214346.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Political position

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The political position needs to be re-evaluated. This party can no longer be considered center-right, and the center-right faction is now a dwindling minority. It is WP:UNDUE to have the position displayed as "Center-right to right-wing". I suggest the simple position of "Right-wing", with no mentions of center-right and far-right. Trumpism (described as "Right-wing to far-right" on its respective article) is the dominant ideology by far and large, and we should stop playing these games that try to hide the reality. I believe the sourcing also supports my proposal. Paul Vaurie (talk) 02:57, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Probably best to remove the field as it is subjective. BTW, what makes you think Nixon, Reagan and George W. Bush were more moderate? TFD (talk) 04:40, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Of course it's subjective. That doesn't mean we shouldn't have it. To a Nazi, the Nazi Party isn't far-right, it's mainstream right-wing. This argument is bogus, that because political position is subjective, it should be omitted from this article. Hell, everything is subjective. The fact that this article even exists is also subjective. It is based on community consensus of notability guidelines.
Also, I never stated that Nixon, Reagan, or the Bushes are somehow more moderate. My argument is that the GOP at this moment in time can be best captured as a solely "right-wing" party, given its stances and characteristics. The traditional definition of center-right doesn't apply to the party of today. Paul Vaurie (talk) 05:27, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The designation of the modern Republican Party as "center" right is absurd. The party very explicitly and publicly aligns itself globally with parties that are unproblematically defined as hard-right at minimum and more frequently far-right, including Fidesz, Brothers of Italy, Law and Justice, National Rally, Reform UK and many more. These are parties that the GOP openly praises and pointedly looks to as models, and vice-versa.
Conversely, the modern Republican Party is indifferent at best and hostile at worst to international parties that are more traditionally "center" right, including Germany's Christian Democrats, Poland's Civic Platform or the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy. These parties, mind you, are ones that the GOP would likely have considered itself relatively ideologically close to a few decades ago.
While the "center" may be a relative and shifting term, calling the modern GOP "center-right" is patently false. It's a clear form of appeasement of a party that's been relentlessly critical of Wikipedia's coverage of it. TKSnaevarr (talk) 02:30, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The Republican Party continues to have close ties with so-called center right parties, particularly in English speaking countries. TFD (talk) 02:56, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Even in the UK, the modern Republican Party has increasingly voiced a clear preference of Farage’s Reform UK over the comparatively more center-right Conservatives. The list of invitees for Trump’s inauguration was stacked with figures that are recognized by Wikipedia and far-right, including Giorgia Meloni, Javier Milei, Éric Zemmour and Viktor Orbán. There were few to no notable center-right political leaders present, with major leaders such as Ursula von der Leyen, Kemi Badenoch, Donald Tusk or Friedrich Merz being snubbed. It’s simply intellectually dishonest to label the various examples I’ve named "right-wing to far-right" while insisting on calling the Republican Party "center-right to right-wing" when they both pursue similar policies and openly see each other as ideological brethren. It’s difficult not to see this as Wikipedia sacrificing objectivity in order to avoid offending right-leaning American readers. 2A01:6F02:150:E511:6DE4:4E42:84BA:C536 (talk) 17:34, 23 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Although I largely agree with you, comparative politics and comparing political positions across different countries is not what ultimately matters, since there is an established view that each country has its own political spectrum. I simply believe that the GOP isn't even center-right by American definitions anymore. Politicians such as the Cheneys, Bushes, and Romney (i.e. the GOP former establishment), who are all largely center-right, did not support Trump's election campaign. Paul Vaurie (talk) 19:00, 23 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Ir definitely does matter because readers cannot be expected to know the ideological spectrum of every country in every time period. Would you call LePen a center-right candidate in the last French presidential election because there was a major candidate even more right-wing than her? TFD (talk) 21:54, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This is why Wikipedia should adhere to the description of reliable (preferably academic) sources rather than try to apply regional definitions of the political compass. We don't say Le Pen is far-right by French standards. We say she is by international academic standards. Simonm223 (talk) 22:02, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Which happily also means we don't need to entertain the idea that a political party is leftist simply by being less right-wing than its opposition. Simonm223 (talk) 22:03, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Left-wing parties in Africa or the Middle East are generally more conservative on social issues than right-wing parties in Europe. Does that mean they aren't left-wing but actually right-wing? Comparative doesn't work. Each country has its own scale. Paul Vaurie (talk) 22:11, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
We really need a moratorium on this. Toa Nidhiki05 03:09, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
On what grounds? That you want to stifle conversation? No. It's clearly a load of BS that the party is still classified as center-right. The sourcing for it is very poor. Paul Vaurie (talk) 04:29, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
No - because this topic comes up constantly, the discussion always ends the same way, nothing new is presented. It's a waste of time. Toa Nidhiki05 04:52, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
A previous discussion on the matter evidently resulted in the designation "center-right to right-wing" being added, when there was none previously. At minimum, the misleading "center-right" designation should be removed and the article reverted to its previous version that did not specify any status on the political spectrum at all. TKSnaevarr (talk) 10:45, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
To the contrary, I've presented so many new, academic, peer reviewed, sources that contradict the "center-right" claim that I've actually got complaints about the volume. Quite a lot new has been presented. You have chosen to ignore it. Simonm223 (talk) 14:34, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The republican party has a much weaker center-right faction than even a far right faction

[edit]

Given Trump is the president and the only moderates in the senate are Susan Collins and Muroski with some other occasional dissent from senators that isn't quite what would would say is enough to be considered moderate it doesn't feel right to say there is a center-right, of course it doesn't really feel right the slightly more powerful but still weak far right faction is (that) powerful either, even if it's growing in scale. The source that credits that there is a center-right neocon faction is 10 years out of date and the rise of populism has thrown out "RINO"s with these exceptions. This isn't a jab at the republican party in a biased manner, I'm not calling them far right for this reason, just saying there is no strong center and not much to stop general non-moderate sentiment. Pundits and news anchormen that were more moderate before that represented republican media have also conceded their centrism to not be disliked by the majority. Kedamomo999 (talk) 04:00, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Trump is in charge, and congressional Republicans are basically giving him what he wants per RS. There is no center or far right, rather it's just that Trump is basically doing what he wants.
Link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/02/03/gop-meek-acquiescence-to-trump/ JohnAdams1800 (talk) 14:13, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Do you have a neutral, justifiable source to provide? Cavdan2024 (talk) 01:37, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. "Centrism" should be removed from the list of ideologies, especially given that the few Republicans who could have hypothetically been called "centrists" (like Mitt Romney) are gone. The "Political positions" should include far-right. Joejoe1864 (talk) 00:30, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

RfC: Should center-right be removed from the infobox?

[edit]

Should center-right be removed from the infobox in the political position section? EarthDude (talk) 04:45, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Can I end the discussion? I lacked involvement in this thread in particular. Pogchampange (talk) 13:07, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Sure EarthDude (talk) 14:40, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I would recommend leaving the RfC open for the normal 1 month then letting an experienced editor close it. A close isn't required but a lack of closing is an issue if someone disputes the results. Springee (talk) 15:08, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Not a WP:VOTESTACK, but just looking around, it seems like there are 10+ editors in agreement over removing "center-right", while only 3-4 are in opposition. Does this indicate consensus? Paul Vaurie (talk) 21:09, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
No it doesn't. Consensus is based on arguments. One argument based on policy can outweigh a million !votes if all of them are trivial. guninvalid (talk) 22:43, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps my question was a bit vague and conveyed that I was asking about whether this indicates consensus "in general." I meant, is there consensus in this specific RfC? Paul Vaurie (talk) 02:46, 13 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The current edit by that one guy seems to properly not technically break the rules of removing center-right before an RfC but also seems to meet what everyone here wants its a pretty good compromise and it shouldn't be reverted Pogchampange (talk) 15:21, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion II

[edit]
  • The political position in the infobox states that the party is center-right to right-wing. However, when I looked at the sources for the center-right claim, one source is marked as obsolete and another is marked with failed verification. The sole source left is from 2019, and states that the party is clearly changing and that Trump is supposedly "remodeling the right" (this is wording from the source). Furthermore, other sources in the article also directly contradict with the view that the Republican Party has a substantial center-right force. The article itself states "Trump's election exacerbated internal schisms within the GOP,[225]: 18  and saw the GOP move from a center coalition of moderates and conservatives to a solidly right-wing party hostile to liberal views and any deviations from the party line.[226]"
While a center-right faction may still be existing, it is clear that it's no longer mainstream in the party. Since it's no longer a defining characteristic of the party, it should be removed from the infobox
On top of that, here are some other sources which go into this:
1. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/21449634/republicans-supreme-court-gop-trump-authoritarian
2. https://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2024/07/politics/republican-gop-platform-annotated-dg/
3. https://www.business-standard.com/article/international/donald-trump-remains-dominant-force-in-republican-party-following-acquittal-121021400093_1.html
EarthDude (talk) 04:56, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed here 2603:8001:1700:25A:5FB0:BFC1:55B0:FE6E (talk) 09:53, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Right wing only makes sense now. Particularly as the "center right" sources continue to age poorly.
Support removing center right. Carlp941 (talk) 15:12, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
While I previously have opposed this for a very long time, I am changing my vote to support due to a large amount of sources within the body of the article that have substantiated the claims that the center of the Republican Party has substantially hollowed out and become next to non-existent. While I think some of the sources that are used in this particular RfC aren't the greatest, other sources already in use on this page are in my view sufficient enough to use as references for the change to simply right-wing. BootsED (talk) 15:06, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
- Support removing as the party received 50% of votes in the last election and there are no significant third parties in the US Dw31415 (talk) 09:33, 14 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The percent of the vote they received should not be relevant in determining their ideology. Joejoe1864 (talk) 00:35, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agree, Javier Milei won 55% of the second-round vote with significant support from traditional center-right parties (with it's politician and voter base) but the political position for his coalition La Libertad Avanza is still labelled Right-wing to Far-right Mhaot (talk) 13:19, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Support removing center right. As part of this change, I also support removing "centrism" from the list of ideologies. Joejoe1864 (talk) 00:33, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - As I've opened up a topic in the space down below, the Senate Republican Conference and House Republican Conference still retain their "center-right to right-wing" labels, which is understandable as people like Mitch McConnell and Lisa Murkowski still remain active in Congress. Even Trump supporting people like John Thune are not explicitly affiliated with Trumpism, noted by how he and actually many other senators are not in the list of politicians associated with Trumpism. The only reason why the GOP in this page and the "List of political parties in the United States" page had their ideology changed was only due to one man: Donald Trump. If both chambers of the Republican legislature are still deemed as "center-right," then I think that justifies enough reason to bring back (unless of course, we change those too) DougheGojiraMan (talk) 22:32, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Right-wing only is my view. I oppose both center-right and far-right. There are certainly some center-right and far-right factions, but the bulk of the party and Trump are described by RS as right-wing. Specifically it's mainly right-wing populism, which has proven to be electorally viable, winning 49.8% of the popular vote in 2024.
There are plenty of sources describing how the Republican Party has lost its establishment, center-right faction since 2016.
  • It's worth nothing that George W. Bush, Dan Quayle, Mike Pence, Dick Cheney, and Mitt Romney didn't attend the 2024 RNC.
  • In early 2024, a good article from Punchbowl News described how the Republican establishment was nearly gone.
  • I don't know if you want to get into the Supreme Court, but the Roberts Court since Trump is the most right-wing Supreme Court probably since the time of FDR.
I oppose far-right, because regardless of our personal political views, the Republican Party is broadly popular with roughly half the country. It has the edge in party identification and won the popular vote in the last presidential election.
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/16/us/politics/rnc-bush-quayle-pence-cheney-romney.html
Link: https://punchbowl.news/article/senate/the-end-of-the-old-republican-party-senate-conference/
Link: https://www.vox.com/scotus/371361/supreme-court-call-republican-justices-republicans

JohnAdams1800 (talk) 05:07, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Claiming that a party can't be a far-right party solely because it is popular is nonsense and original research. Cortador (talk) 07:12, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I oppose far-right, because regardless of our personal political views, the Republican Party is broadly popular with roughly half the country
This is what, the fifth time you’re proposed this exact reason for opposing any change in this way, and you’ve been told repeatedly that it’s WP:OR and an inappropriate way to determine accurate information on articles. Please stop putting original research forward as a reason. Editors aren’t going to respond positively to it and it’s frankly a little disruptive that you’re keeping at it. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 10:05, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

There's literally already a discussion going on about this. Toa Nidhiki05 05:04, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That discussion is about the inclusion of far-right to the infobox specifically, and doesn't deal a whole lot with the center-right claim of the infobox EarthDude (talk) 05:49, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Toa Nidhiki05 That discussion is a garbled mess where everyone is arguing with each other. Frankly Trump strikes me as reminiscent of Miklós Horthy from Hungary, as someone who edits biographies and history articles in Wikipedia. This is not a discussion about history, but from a historical perspective and judging among center-right governments abroad versus far-right ones, Trump straddles a unique dividing line. Trump is both reactionary yet futuristic, forging alliances with some of the richest men in human history like Elon Musk.
  • "Between 1919 and 1944, Hungary was a rightist country. Forged out of a counter-revolutionary heritage, its governments advocated a "nationalist Christian" policy; they extolled heroism, faith, and unity; they despised the French Revolution; and they spurned the liberal and socialist ideologies of the 19th century. The governments saw Hungary as a bulwark against Bolshevism and Bolshevism's instruments: socialism, cosmopolitanism, and freemasonry. They perpetrated the rule of a small clique of aristocrats, civil servants, and army officers, and surrounded with adulation by the head of the state, the counterrevolutionary Admiral Horthy."
JohnAdams1800 (talk) 05:14, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If you want the difference between right-wing and far-right/fascist, I would refer to Germany's last monarch, Wilhelm II on Adolf Hitler.
  • "There's a man alone, without family, without children, without God [...] He builds legions, but he doesn't build a nation. A nation is created by families, a religion, traditions: it is made up out of the hearts of mothers, the wisdom of fathers, the joy and the exuberance of children [...] For a few months I was inclined to believe in National Socialism. I thought of it as a necessary fever. And I was gratified to see that there were, associated with it for a time, some of the wisest and most outstanding Germans. But these, one by one, he has got rid of, or even killed ... Papen, Schleicher, Neurath – and even Blomberg. He has left nothing but a bunch of shirted gangsters! [...] This man could bring home victories to our people each year, without bringing them either glory or (danger). But of our Germany, which was a nation of poets and musicians, of artists and soldiers, he has made a nation of hysterics and hermits, engulfed in a mob and led by a thousand liars or fanatics."
JohnAdams1800 (talk) 05:16, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Just so we're clear; what argument are you making? And how is it relevant to this RfC? guninvalid (talk) 06:58, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm making the argument that at the national level, the Republican Party is now de facto just Trump, except for maybe writing tax/budget legislation. So I view this entire discussion as just trying to characterize Trump. What exactly is the party doing at the national level that isn't approved or done by Trump? Even the SCOTUS is just bending over backwards to accommodate his wishes, given he appointed 1/3 of the justices and could soon appoint a majority.
And in the historical context, Trump is similar to right-wing but not far-right leaders. I'll get sources, with my view that Trump is wielding power on par with a constitutional monarch or regent. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 14:33, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Unless you have sources that specifically back up that the GOP equals just Trump and that Trump is just right wing and not far right, AND said sources outweigh those which just attribute an ideology to the party, this is, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, more original research. Cortador (talk) 15:16, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Part I: The GOP just equals Trump.
Sources: [1][2][3]
Part II: Trump is just right-wing and not far-right.
Sources: See the multitude of sources in the article describing right-wing populism as the dominant faction of the Republican Party on the article. It's right-wing, not center-right or far-right. Also there have been RfC's on Trump's talk page opposing describing him as far-right. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 15:37, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
By that (dubious) logic the party position should be right wing to far right and possibly neo-fascist, since those are the positions the article on Trumpism uses, which in turn is what your first source uses. Cortador (talk) 15:54, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
As far as saying, "Trump is just right-wing, not far-right", how does that reconcile with RS calling Trumpism a variant of far-right ideology?
For example....
During the 2010s the far-right replacement theory became popular in the United States among white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and right-wing militias, among other extremists, whose racist rhetoric and ideas were more freely expressed during the presidency of Donald Trump (2017–21). Right-wing media personalities, including Fox News commentators Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham, also attested to the conspiracy, though in ostensibly milder language that did not directly refer to race or explicitly invoke anti-Semitism.
In part because of its endorsement by right-wing media and in part because Trump, in his own way, had signaled his support of racism toward people of colour (e.g., by indulging in racist slurs, by accepting the support of prominent avowed racists, and by refusing to condemn—or only reluctantly condemning—racist violence), key aspects of replacement theory came to be accepted by nearly half of Republicans and by a third of all Americans by 2022. Some Republican politicians also endorsed the theory as a way of appealing to far-right members of their party and of demonstrating, to some degree, their continued loyalty to Trump.
Cheers... DN (talk) 10:35, 19 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I actually can no longer make hide nor hair of what point you're trying to make. That said, "fascist" isn't an alternative term for far right, it's a specific subset of far right. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 13:28, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak keep or reword. For my entire life until around somewhere between 2015 and 2025, the Republican party has always been described in pretty much every major source as a center-right to right-wing party. I think that warrants either keeping it or describing it as "historically center-right". (Yapperbot says hi!) guninvalid (talk) 07:02, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    That would be something suitable for the body, not the infobox. The infobox should reflect the current sourcing on the position. Cortador (talk) 07:08, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    There are a few cases I've seen of political parties which have a notable/recent historical position listed alongside their current position (see also: Mongolian People's Party, Jobbik, etc). Perhaps list right-wing as the current position, then in a note or new line state center-right as a historical position, each with sources? HapHaxion (talk / contribs) 20:58, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    How far back are we going for that, and is that even necessary? The Republican Party (and the Democratic Party) date back almost two centuries. We have sections on their histories and actions.
    If you're just talking about the transformation since Trump, that's one thing. But I don't think any historical notes are necessary. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 21:43, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. The current sourcing is weak. The 2015 source is fairly old and merely calls the GOP a "political instrument" of the centre-right. Another, as EarthDude pointed out, supports a shift away from the centre-right. The text cited for the third source is nowhere to be found in the actual linked source, but even if it was, a single source is insufficient to support a party position. Cortador (talk) 07:30, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Just for clarity, the second and third sources are marked as obsolete and failed verification respectively. The first source is the only valid source, which itself is 5 years old (being from 2019) EarthDude (talk) 07:50, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Support per the above. HapHaxion (talk / contribs) 19:44, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment The main article on centre-right politics claims that centre-right parties and factions have been in decline since the 2010s.: "The centre-right underwent a decline throughout the western world in the late 2010s and early 2020s, led by demographic changes such as increased tertiary education and ethnic diversity as well as the waning influence of religion and the rise of identity politics. At this time, the centre-left came into power and centre-right parties drifted rightward or were supplanted by new far-right parties." [4] Dimadick (talk) 07:50, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Comment That is a good source, and I read it. We should incorporate it into the article, which I'll work on this month. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 21:58, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

References

  1. ^ Ball, Molly (January 23, 2024). "The GOP Wants Pure, Uncut Trumpism". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on January 24, 2024. Retrieved February 22, 2024.
  2. ^ Swan, Jonathan; Haberman, Maggie (December 12, 2024). "The Stock Market and TV: Trump's Most Durable Guardrails". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved January 20, 2025. Mr. Trump is likely to receive only the meekest resistance from his own party, which will control both the House and Senate and whose members fear Trump-backed primary challengers. He has completed his hostile takeover of the Republican Party and the dissenters have been driven into retirement, defeated in primaries or cowed into silence.
  3. ^ Cohn, Nate (December 25, 2024). "Trump's Re-election Defines a New Era of American Politics". The New York Times. Retrieved December 25, 2024. Instead, it's the three Trump elections — in 2016, 2020 and 2024 — that look as if they have the makings of a new era of politics, one defined by Donald J. Trump's brand of conservative populism. ... Much of the Republican Party's old establishment — like the Cheneys, the Romneys, Paul Ryan — is now without a home.
  4. ^ Cliffe, Jeremy (2023-02-15). "The Strange Death of the Centre Right". New Statesman. Archived from the original on 2023-02-25.
  • Support Even the "Compassionate Conservative" period of George W. Bush is not uniformly described as center-right by academic literature, with some scholars note a continual rightward shift throughout that period. The Southern Strategy is decades ago at this point and calling the Republican party center-right depends on either outdated academic sources or lower-quality news media sources that have a financial incentive to stick with the American Overton window. Wikipedia, menawhile, should not stick to the American Overton window and should, instead, cleave to academic best sources. Simonm223 (talk) 15:39, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Simonm223 The Southern strategy was only completed around 2010, contrary to popular wisdom. I'm the main editor of Solid South, writing almost half of the article, including the section on the Southern Strategy.
  • If you want milestones, it was in the 1994 Republican Revolution that Republicans won a majority of Southern U.S. House seats, the 2000 presidential election that Republicans consistently won almost every single former Confederate state (except Virginia since 2008) in elections, and around 2010 that Southern state legislatures finally became Republican.
With respect to center-right, I agree that the Republican Party is not center-right except for some small factions or politicians, and is instead whatever academic sources describe Trumpism as. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 22:12, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia absolutely should stick with US centric definitions of right and left when describing US political parties. The claim that the US is far anything seem to be used by those who are arguing to a conclusion and decide that many countries outside of Europe/former English colonies don't count. Also, the "southern strategy" has become a very nebulous term that seems to serve many masters. The core part of the "southern strategy" really only applied to Nixon's presidential strategy and then the facts are open to interpretation. However, as anything "southern strategy" is bad (just as the GOP is now seeing anything DEI as "bad" regardless of the merits) it's handy for partisan commentators etc to call out "southern strategy" as an alternative to crying racist. Springee (talk) 12:59, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Absolutely not. We are a global encyclopedia, we are not Ameripedia and we should be using academic definitions and not the disinformation-distorted American local definitions. Simonm223 (talk) 13:11, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Also I have to say that suggesting that basic historical concepts like the southern strategy has become a very nebulous term that seems to serve many masters is an amusing claim. You can't mystify the 20th century just yet. We all still remember it. Simonm223 (talk) 13:14, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
So should we use Japan's perspective when deciding right vs left? It's quite reasonable to say left or right vs where you are now vs where someone else is. Your comment about the southern strategy is of topic here but yes, the term has had a lot of usage creep and even in our article it doesn't have a clear definition thus the label can be invoked when convenient. Springee (talk) 13:46, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Left and right are fairly clearly defined in theory. It is pretty easy to source credible theory papers and discussion to place any government anywhere on earth on a left-right axis, with caveats that not everyone will agree on all aspects and some may be understudied. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 14:08, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Precisely. We are not using any nation's folk-idea of left and right. We use academic sources. This is Wikipedia. That's what we do. Simonm223 (talk) 17:34, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support. Center-right is no longer warranted, and the sourcing is embarrassingly weak for it. Far-right is also not supported as a general position for the overall party. The party is mainstream Right-wing today, as proposed, and as reflected by how Right-wing populism has found its way into the "majority" part of the ideology section. The sourcing for right-wing is much, much stronger than for center-right. Paul Vaurie (talk) 09:04, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Support for the same reasons. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 14:29, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose but open to options. In a very general sense the GOP is the right wing of US politics and the Democrats are the left wing. So in that regard I think it would be just fine to say "right-wing" and call the Democrats "left-wing". In all cases it needs to be understood that when one looks across the nation the parties have people who will span from center to far. I do agree that Trump has moved the party to the right while Obama moved the Democrats to the left. The center is not as big as it was in say the 1990s (for both parties). Springee (talk) 12:59, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Comment: This is false equivalence. This fails to take into account how the Republican Party is led by one person, Donald Trump, unlike the Democratic Party. What exactly are we discussing, when both the party's voters and its elected officials are beholden to Trump? See the CNN poll, which describes how the party is less about ideology than loyalty to Trump.
    For the Democrats, during Biden's presidency his agenda was subject to intense negotiations and was often blocked by centrists like Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema.[1] The Democratic Party forced Biden out of the presidential race in 2024 as well. For lack of better phrasing, the Democratic Party spans a much larger range of views, and is not beholden to a single person.
    "And many of those aligned with the GOP view loyalty to Trump as central to their political identity. A 53% majority say that supporting Trump is a very important part of what being a Republican means to them. That’s up from 34% who said the same in late summer 2021, months after the end of Trump’s first term. It also outpaces the share who now assign similar value to tenets like favoring a less powerful federal government (46%), supporting congressional Republicans (42%) or opposing Democratic policies (32%); only “holding conservative values and policy positions” (54%) carries similar weight."[2] JohnAdams1800 (talk) 14:22, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Again this seems to be a preference for local folk-definitions of left and right. We should adhere to academic definitions in all cases. Simonm223 (talk) 19:13, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: the failed verification source (Routledge handbook on political parties) is just linked to a completely different PDF, presumably just an editing error mixing up a source used for the party's far-right factions. I don't have access to the full text but a search of it on Google books can confirm the text as quoted appears on the cited page fairly easily. I don't think it is particularly compelling to cite a source using the term centre right while describing all the ways the party doesn't fit that term anyway but thought it worth mentioning. Chaste Krassley (talk) 14:48, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Comment: This source (link below) provided by @Dimadick is very good at describing how center-right parties across the Western world have shifted to the right, and/or other right-wing or far-right parties have gained in popularity (for multi-party countries). In Europe, this includes Germany's AfD ("Alternative for Germany"), France's National Rally, Italy's Brothers of Italy, Britain's Reform UK, etc. Or in Latin America, Brazil's Jair Bolsonaro and Argentina's Javier Milei.
    • The point is right-wing populism and the rise of right-wing to far-right parties in recent years (i.e. in the 2010s and 2020s) isn't solely an American phenomenon. And center-right parties, politicians, and ideologies have been in decline among voters in terms of support.
    According to the source, which confirms what other sources on educational polarization have said, part of this is due to educational polarization causing splits between the college-educated but less socially conservative (on a broad range of issues) versus the non-college but more socially conservative.
    Link: https://www.newstatesman.com/international-politics/2023/02/strange-death-centre-right-moderate-conservatism JohnAdams1800 (talk) 15:36, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support the removal of "centre-right" in the infobox. Republican party is currently led by the far-right MAGA movement, which is an American ultra-nationalist political faction that is based on Trumpism. As of 2024, Trumpists dominate and control the Republican Party.[3][4]
Outdated or obsolete sources are currently cited in the infobox to claim that Republicans are a centre-right party. The Republican party is not described as a centre-right party in "The Routledge Handbook of Political Parties" (2023) book which is currently cited along those obsolete sources in the infobox. Shadowwarrior8 (talk) 19:09, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Permission to close RfC and declare consensus 2603:8001:1700:25A:2DA7:146D:2F73:F7E3 (talk) 13:44, 6 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
No I don't think it'd be a good idea to have a dynamic IP interpret this consensus. No offense. Simonm223 (talk) 13:46, 6 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Should I do it? (I’m relatively new here, but just from skimming the RFC I can see a consensus. RiverMan18 (talk) 14:35, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I dont see an issue with it, but I'd give it another day or two. Up to you though! Carlp941 (talk) 20:26, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Closures require a knowledge of Wikipedia's policies and guidelines, as well as an understanding of how to evaluate a close. A random dynamic IP where this is the only edit isn't exactly going to instil confidence that this was adjudicated fairly (even if it is), which is a problem as this isn't a WP:SNOW closure. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 20:38, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Not to mention WP:RFC guidelines explicitly state that IPs are not permitted to close RfCs. Any uninvolved confirmed or autoconfirmed editor can close RfCs, but I really don't recommend it. Any close is likely to be challenged and brought to WP:CLOSECHALLENGE if you play nice and WP:ANI if not. guninvalid (talk) 01:01, 8 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
For clarity I was not suggesting that the IP close it, just that i didnt have an issue with @RiverMan18 closing it. Carlp941 (talk) 05:09, 16 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Sure, go for it! Theres been a few days since the discussion has gotten any new comments, and there is a very clear consensus to remove center-right lol EarthDude (talk) 13:21, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The one thing I'd recommend if a newer editor closes is to read the RfC carefully before closing rather than skimming and seeing a rough consensus. Because an RfC is not a vote the quality of specific arguments is critical to accurately assessing consensus. A closure note that engages with substantive arguments, even those it ultimately felt did not have consensus, is generally wise. Simonm223 (talk) 13:29, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If we see the arguments presented, I see only two that oppose removing center-right, and want to keep it in the infobox. For those who want to remove center-right, its mostly on reliable sources stating so, and the infobox stating that the article is center-right having bad sourcing. Toa Nidhiki05 argued that there are recent good sources for the party still having a mainstream center-right position, but when asked, didn't provide any. The only other editor who opposed, simply claimed that the Republicans are the right-wing of US politics and Dems the left-wing but didnt add anything further and didnt use scholarly definitions or sources for it. The arguments are also much stronger for those wanting to remove center-right from the infobox. You seem to be an experienced editor, maybe you can close the discussion? EarthDude (talk) 13:48, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If you mean me then, no, I am far, far too involved in the discussion to close. Ideally the closer should not have !voted in the RfC. I've done that, provided sources, and got involved in an arbitration action that came out of the other related RfC regarding infoboxes and political alignment. In that context I could not close this RfC in a way that wouldn't be perceived as POV. Simonm223 (talk) 13:56, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Remove field Let readers decide where the party lies in their own perception of the political spectrum. Use of the field conveys no useful information. TFD (talk) 14:43, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    That's just factually false. The field does convey important information. Parties are commonly described by their political position. Paul Vaurie (talk) 22:13, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support the removal of "centre-right" in the infobox,(Summoned by bot) sources record the description as now clearly out of date. There are certainly some center-right and far-right factions, but the bulk of the party and Trump are described by RS as right-wing. Specifically it's mainly right-wing populism, per JohnAdams1800 and Republican party is currently led by the far-right MAGA movement, which is an American ultra-nationalist political faction that is based on Trumpism. As of 2024, Trumpists dominate and control the Republican Party per Shadowwarrior8. Pincrete (talk) 04:39, 21 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I reverted the closing by an editor with just 4 edits to their username. We aren't quite in SNOW territory here and given there is no time limit it's best to let this run out naturally. RiverMan18 removed the material from the article based on the closing I reverted[1]. Since it looks like that is where this will probably end up and since they were following the closing I would suggest leaving the good faith edit in place. Springee (talk) 14:20, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  • Replace "To" With Comma This is a contingent !vote to replace the word "to" with a comma if "center-right" is kept: Center-right to Right-wing --> Center-right, Right-wing. None of the sources on either side indicate there is a spectrum of beliefs spanning the center-right to right-wing, each make their claims in silos, apparently indicating there are center-right and right-wing elements within the party, as opposed to indicating a unified party ideology that combines center-right and right-wing ideas. The word "to" puts us in violation of WP:SYNTH by combining "material from multiple sources to state or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources". Chetsford (talk) 18:47, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Center-right and right-wing are generally considered to be adjacent on the political spectrum, so there is nothing in between them. At the same time, "centre-right to right-wing" doesn't mean the party's position is literally in the middle of the two positions, rather, the party exhibits traits of both positions. It's inclusive, not exclusive. Anyways. Paul Vaurie (talk) 23:51, 22 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"the party exhibits traits of both positions" That's not supported by the sources extant. The sources extant either say "center-right" or "right-wing" they don't say "incorporating elements of the center-right and right wings". If some sources say the sky is blue, and others say the sky is yellow, we can't put on Wikipedia "the sky is sometimes blue and sometimes yellow" or "some parts of the sky are blue and others are yellow" or "the sky is green". "To", as a preposition, indicates a relationship between each element which is not supported by sources. A comma is more appropriate. Chetsford (talk) 00:17, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm arguing for just right-wing in this specific case. But the format "position to position" is fully valid and I support it in some instances. When sourcing is split evenly about what the position is, we usually do that. Paul Vaurie (talk) 00:20, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It's invalid. Chetsford (talk) 00:23, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I agree with some other support positions stated here. While Center-right was a mainstay for a long period of time, it is no longer warranted according to what many sources might consider or refer to as a paradigmatic shift further to the right since 2016. Cheers. DN (talk) 00:27, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Support for the above reasons. One of the best examples of this is the Supreme Court itself, dominated by Republicans and which has shifted further to the right since 2016.
    • I have sources saying that the Roberts Court (current SCOTUS with 3 Trump appointees) is no longer center-right, but right-wing in a below discussion. In many of the Roberts Court decisions, it has cast aside center-right decisions and become much more rigidly partisan and ideological--not just Dobbs, but also say the Trump immunity case and enabling voter suppression and gerrymandering. These decisions have been supported by the Republican Party, and simply cannot be dismissed as center-right politics.
    JohnAdams1800 (talk) 02:51, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

References

  1. ^ Luscombe, Richard (3 October 2021). "Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema: The centrists blocking Biden's agenda". The Guardian.
  2. ^ Edwards-Levy, Ariel (January 19, 2025). "CNN Poll: Most Democrats think their party needs major change, while the GOP coalesces around Trump". CNN. Retrieved January 20, 2025.
  3. ^ Ball, Molly (January 23, 2024). "The GOP Wants Pure, Uncut Trumpism". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on January 24, 2024. Retrieved February 22, 2024.
  4. ^ Eisler, Parker, Peter, Ned (16 August 2024). "How Trump's intimidation tactics have reshaped the Republican Party". Reuters.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
"I find it telling that there are no calls to change "center-left" on the Democratic Party (United States) page"...See WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS
"The attempts to change the infobox to "push" this page towards representing this party as farther "right" are simple attempts to use Wikipedia"...See WP:AGF.
Cheers. DN (talk) 02:21, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
OSE does not apply here. When there is a coordinated effort to use Wikipedia to push a POV, that warrants being pointed out. I am assuming that editors are acting in good faith - but that does not require me to overlook their unintentional POV pushing or allowing their own personal biases into their comments on a topic. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 02:29, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
What makes you assume it is "coordinated"? DN (talk) 02:37, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
How about this, Berchanhimez: perhaps you are the one pushing their POV in this discussion? There is no "coordinated effort" here. Aren't you making a bad-faith assumption by saying that? Never mind that your statement about "far-left politicians in the Democratic Party" is 1. irrelevant, 2. false, 3. false equivalence, and 4. not even about the same type of position change, as here we're discussing the removal of center-right, not the addition of far-right. See the above RfC for that. Paul Vaurie (talk) 02:46, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The fact that American Politics has been designated as a contentious topic is more than enough evidence that there is a history of coordinated POV pushing in this topic area. Regardless of what you think, there are still hundreds, if not thousands, of center-right politicians in the GOP. So trying to remove center right from the party designation is blatant trying to rewrite the narrative using Wikipedia. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 02:54, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Hundreds if not thousands? DN (talk) 03:25, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Who are those thousands of center-right politicians? Sources are not reflecting what you are saying. This RfC proposal isn't being done lightly: it is based on appropriate interpretation of available sourcing. Paul Vaurie (talk) 03:36, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It's based on cherry picked sources which are pushing their own pov. Treating those sources as above those that report on the totality of the circumstances (such as the NYT, for example) is POV pushing. You can find reliable sources that will purport to say almost anything. And there's many sources that do not say the GOP as a whole is far right (or no longer center). Choosing only those that say what you want is not appropriate. You cannot simply ignore all the sources that do not comment on the issue at all and claim that because they don't comment they must agree with you. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 03:39, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You seem to be engaging in bad faith. Please read WP:Assume good faith. Have a good day. Paul Vaurie (talk) 05:20, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I have assumed good faith. I have merely pointed out that people in this (and other) discussions are cherry picking sources. I have assumed that is unintentional, and rather than provide any arguments to how they aren't doing that, you've chosen to personally attack me. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 05:22, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I was saying we should cleave to academic sources - how is that cherry picking? Simonm223 (talk) 13:10, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Which prominent Democratic politicians are "far-left", and which of those are in anything other than marginal positions within the party apparatus? Iostn (talk) 08:42, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Lean towards oppose As 'centre-right' still describes the philosophy of some parts of the Republican Party, and because the party at a state level may in some cases (particularly in the north-east) still by and large be reasonably described as centre-right. This is a tough one as Trump's administration is anything but centrist and he has unfathomable power within the party today.

On the other hand, it may be the unfortunate truth that 'right-wing' is now the average between centre-right and far-right Republicans. The average centre-right American may still choose to associate more with the Republican Party, and vote for it.

I have placed a tag on the article drawing readers & contributors to this discussion as I believe that is warranted for this is an important differentiation. I hope I am not prolonging this discussion longer than it should be. Kind regards, Will Thorpe (talk) 10:30, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I have just fixed one of the references for 'centre-right' by adding a correct URL and removing the 'failed verification' tag. Will Thorpe (talk) 11:38, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Alternatively the order can be reversed so that it reads 'right-wing to centre-right'. Will Thorpe (talk) 11:47, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I am not denying that the party does not have any center-right group or tendency. What this discussion is about is whether or not center-right is still mainstream enough to warrant a place in the infobox. For example, the Republican Party has members and caucuses with dozens of different ideologies but only some are in the infobox because the rest are too fringe to count and would clutter space. Center-right used to be a mainstream position but has become increasingly fringe in recent years and is no longer mainstream enough to be included in the infobox. EarthDude (talk) 14:18, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Center-rigjt figures have largely been driven out of positions of power in the Republican party and a large proportion of their former luminaries have largely left public life. Simonm223 (talk) 14:49, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This is true, but it is worth looking at the composition of the Republican Party in Congress. A large portion of members remain part of caucuses identified as centre-right or centrist, or have been identified as moderate Republicans, included some elected in recent years.
It is also worth looking at the state branches, in the north-west and Utah particularly.
You may be right that 'right-wing' only is the best descriptor, but these facets need to be considered. If in a couple of days there's no notable change in the state of this discussion or it is stale then I for one fully consent to the infobox being amended. Will Thorpe (talk) 00:31, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I lean on for putting Right-Wing as political position:
- There are mainstream conservative parties that is not listed as Center-Right such as Likud in Israel (Right-Wing), Fidesz in Hungary (Right-Wing to far-right), Liberal Democratic Party (Japan) (Right-Wing), Bharatiya Janata Party in India (Right-Wing to far-right) and People Power Party (South Korea) (Right-wing). I will use Likud as the closest example given there was a largely contentious debate in their talk page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Likud) whether it should include "Centre-Right" with very similar arguments to this talk page (Likud varies from Centre Right to Far-right etc.) but the consensus ended up retaining as Right-Wing
- In the Chinese and Spanish wiki page for example, listed as them as Right-Wing with Center-Right to Far-right Factions
- Some people say just because nearly half of Americans voted for Trump means that it has to be at least "Center-Right" but Political Position is about core base, policies and party ideology not about voters themselves. Javier Milei won 56% of the vote yet his alliance is still labelled Right-Wing to Far-right despite having consolidating support from Center-right parties and voters (due to the two-round voting system).
- Parties that are labelled Center-Right to Right-Wing (e.g. Liberal Party of Australia , Conservative Party (UK) , Conservative Party of Canada) are mainly because are Right-wing Populist on certain issues (e.g. Settler Colonialism and Indigenous issues for Australia, Brexit for UK, and anti-Trudeau sentiment for Canada) else they remain moderate or center-right on most other issues.
- As for Local and State branches such as Vermont Republican Party, they can get separate political positions from the National Party (e.g. Liberal Party of Australia is Centre-Right to Right-Wing but Tasmanian Liberal Party is simply Centre-right)

Mhaot (talk) 04:12, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support removing center-right. I think a simple descriptor as Right-wing would leave open that such ideologies within vary in intensity. It's just the most neutral descriptor here. Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 05:00, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - Even leaving aside the continued decline/irrelevance of GOP moderates, "right-wing" just by itself is an open, sufficiently ambiguous term that can encompass the party broadly. Listing "centre-right" today is actively misleading, if anything I'd argue this is more of a compromise that leaves "far-right" unlisted. I suppose we could list "centre-right and far-right factions" but simply stating right-wing is both simple and the least controversial. Iostn (talk) 08:38, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    This is true, though the response should be taken on what is most merited on fact. Still, it seems the composition of the Republican Party today may well justify 'right-wing' as the average and best descriptor of its current platform.
    Still, as I stated, a very large portion of Republicans in the Congress belong to caucuses identified as centrist, centre-right or moderate, such as the Main Street Caucus. I'm not sure how to square this. Regards, Will Thorpe (talk) 10:43, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    The other issue is that a number of recent reliable sources (listed in infobox) still refer to the party as centre-right at least in part. Even one debatably marked as obsolete, in what I think may be a case of WP:POVPUSHING, is only from 2015.
    I propose that if we do make it simply 'right-wing', which it seems we will, we include a note acknowledging that Republicans exist on a spectrum from centre-right (or even centrist) to far-right, attributed to reliable sources including those already present. Will Thorpe (talk) 02:54, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    This is why I made a proposed compromise which is already done in the Chinese and Spanish wiki pages
    Right-wing
    Factions:
    Centre-right to far-right Mhaot (talk) 06:43, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Support above proposal. Will Thorpe (talk) 08:06, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    @EarthDude @Simonm223 @JohnAdams1800 @Berchanhimez @Paul Vaurie I'm reaching out to all you for your opinions on the proposal. Will Thorpe (talk) 08:10, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    See WP:CANVAS DN (talk) 09:21, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    All followed. Will Thorpe (talk) 13:05, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Im averse to keeping center-right in the infobox. Center-right politics have been marginalized from being a formerly mainstream position of the party to a now fringe position. Knowing this, maintaining center-right in the infobox would be very misleading and cluttering, since its only supposed to show a party's main ideologies and positions, not every single one of them no matter how small or fringe they are. This is especially the case for US politics, where the two party system, and to a lesser extent the sheer size of the country, has incentivized both the Democrats and the Republicans to have a huge range of ideologies and positions, even though recent years have seen a lot of polarization and radicalization. So again, center-right should be removed from the infobox period. Maybe, a small efn note could be added stating the party used to be historically center-right. EarthDude (talk) 12:59, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Look at the Republican Governance Group and the Main Street Partnership. These still have dozens of members in Congress, some of whom have been recently elected. Will Thorpe (talk) 13:04, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm averse to including centre-right in the infobox too since I think that presents an inaccurate view of the Republican party as viewed from the outside. As I've mentioned before Wikipedia is an international project and should use an international perspective. I would be willing to allow a compromise of just calling the Republicans right-wing without any qualifiers in the infobox. Simonm223 (talk) 13:13, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Unfortunately, Wikipedia library indicates that there are zero academic sources that discuss the Republican Governance Group by that name. Meanwhile there are two academic sources since 2016 that discuss the Main Street Partnership.
    1. Who are President Trump's Allies in the House of Representatives? By: Clarke, Andrew J.; Jenkins, Jeffery A. Forum (2194-6183). Oct2017, Vol. 15 Issue 3, p415-429. 15p. DOI: 10.1515/for-2017-0029.
      Please note that this source is from 2017 - that will be relevant later. From the abstract We build our analysis around three groups of Republicans, based on caucus affiliations: members of the Republican Main Street Partnership (RMSP), the Republican Study Committee (RSC), and the House Freedom Caucus (HFC). We find that House Republicans, regardless off caucus membership, broadly support President Trump and largely shared in the his electoral success. Yet, we also uncover suggestive evidence that the HFC is maneuvering into a position of influence with President Trump. Freedom Caucus members are more closely tied to his electoral performance than members of other conservative groups, and they appear to receive more time with the President relative to a comparable group of House Republicans. They include information that does indicate that the RMSP is, on average, less conservative than other Republican groups, representing the least conservative faction that exists within the Republican party. The Republican Main Street Partnership represents the centrist members of the House GOP. Their mission is to serve as “the governing wing of the Republican Party,” with an emphasis on economic and national security policy.[5] The RMSP includes the less formal “Tuesday Group,” with prominent leaders like Charlie Dent (PA-15) and Elise Stefanik (NY-21). Charlie Dent is no longer in Congress. Stefanik is likely leaving soon to take up a position as Ambasador to the UN with delays coming from within her own party in response to Democrat maneuvers that would keep her seat empty for an extended period of time. However it seems safe to conclude that her days in congress are numbered. This is editorial but it's interesting to note she's being appointed to an ambassadorship to a body that Trump loyalists in the Republican party have discussed exiting with some seriousness. As such the two identified leaders of Republican centrism in 2017 are no longer in positions of significant leadership.
      The average Republican had a Trump Support score of 97%, with 99 lawmakers providing perfect support for the President. Interestingly, we see dissension among centrist and non-centrist Republicans. For example, two of the three least supportive Republicans were from competing factions; Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL-27) is a member of the Main Street Partnership, while Justin Amash (MI-03) is a founding member of the House Freedom Caucus and a vocal opponent of the President. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen left congress in 2019. Justin Amash left congress in 2021. nearly every Republican has offered extensive support to date.
      Turning to who Trump favored in 2017 the article says The results suggest that, after accounting for several possible confounding variables, membership in the House Freedom Caucus increases the probability of receiving face time with President Trump. By contrast, membership in the RMSP and RSC produces no such relationship.
      Turning to the conclusion they said Trump also appears confident in his capacity to use primary challengers to cow obstinate co-partisans, as the simmering proxy war in Jeff Flake’s (AZ) re-election campaign suggests. This is supported by the fact that every single named Republican opponent of Trumps, bar one, is no longer a member of congress. This includes Mitch McConnell who is mentioned as disliking Trump and who is not seeking re-election although, in his case, this may be principally because of advanced age which is why I left him out above in this literature review. Whatever President Trump’s strategy may be, congressional Republicans are in for a challenging couple of years. Having secured the full legislative power of the federal government, they now face the daunting task of preserving a fractured coalition in the House and overcoming publicly advertised disagreements with the White House. is the final word of this 2017 paper.
    2. Subpartisan Cues and Ideological Distinctions: The Effect of the Tea Party Label on Voter Perceptions of Congressional Candidates*. By: Gervais, Bryan T., Taylor, Jeffrey A., Social Science Quarterly (Wiley-Blackwell), 00384941, Nov2016, Vol. 97, Issue 5 A note - this is a 2016 source. It is also passing mention only, proposing more research would be useful regarding groups that were near the R/D boundary such as the Republican Main Street Coalition and Blue Dog Democrats.
    Our own page on the Main Street Partnership indicates it was fully dissolved in 2019. It re-formed in 2021 but with the specific caveat that The group won’t take policy positions.[2] (apologies for using a lower-quality news source. After 2017 the Main Street Partnership were not apparently deemed significant enough for academic attention).
    Ultimately it does seem like Clarke and Jenkins had a finger on the pulse when they indicated Republican factions were largely somewhat irrelevant - the average Republican lawmaker provided legislative support to Trump 97% of the time. It's his party. They're all just warm bodies to him.
    I will note my previous literature reviews only looked at the Republican party holistically and did not drill down to specific factions. However, on this minimal basis, I think I will formally adjust my position to suggesting that the infobox be adjusted to just say "Right-Wing" without any qualifiers. The academic literature on the most moderate Republicans paints an ambivalent picture of a group that either remained loyal to Trump or who subsequently left politics. I don't think it would be appropriate, considering the extent to which Republican legislators seem to operate as armatures of Trump, regardless of personal political convictions, to assign any more specific labels in either direction.
    The one weakness of this literature review is the dearth of academic literature on the Main Street Partnership and the total absence of academic literature on the Republican Governance Group. Simonm223 (talk) 13:52, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    It is worth noting that Romney – a prominent moderate – was replaced by another. Collins and Murkowski remain in the Senate, whilst others who hold centre-right positions unfortunately will be biting their tongues when it comes to explicit criticism of Trump. Obviously this is a horrific state for the party to be in. I don't think moderation can be assessed entirely on what members explicitly express about Trump, and their close alignment to Trump on most legislative votes may not indicate much either, if these positions are often just reflecting of longstanding GOP policy. Will Thorpe (talk) 05:21, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Being the good materialist that I am I feel that their actions (supporting Trump legislatively) are much more significant for identifying their ideological underpinnings than their rhetoric. However, ultimately, my opinion as a political philosopher are somewhat irrelevant (unless I publish something on the topic and work up the nerve to WP:SELFCITE ;) ) and what is relevant is what RSes say. Unfortunately, when it comes to these factions, the answer is that RSes don't say much. And that's why I think we should leave out the factional conditions and ranges and just call the Republicans a right-wing party. It's accurate, well sourced, clear, correct and non-controversial. Simonm223 (talk) 13:44, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Oppose center-right, just stick to right-wing. We have RS on how the party has become increasingly right-wing and has contributed to democratic backsliding. I would suggest looking at the Roberts Court page for how the party has shifted to becoming right-wing as one example. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 15:22, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Oppose proposal with factions. I think this is giving WP:UNDUE weight to the center and far right aspects of the party. In my understanding, the vast mainstream of the party is simply right-wing, nothing more. There are some center and far right factions, but they are not prominent enough to warrant such inclusion in the infobox. We already have "factions" listed in the ideology section. However, if we want to leave a hatnote, I would find that to be more appropriate of a proposal. Paul Vaurie (talk) 16:23, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I would also be amenable to an efn or hatnote placed at the bottom of the infobox, as seen on the page for the Liberal Party of Australia. Will Thorpe (talk) 05:24, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Moratorium

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Concerning "ideology" and "political positions", in this article's infobox. When the related RFCs (now in progress) have concluded? There should be a moratorium placed on the general topic, anywhere's from six months to a year. Anybody agree? GoodDay (talk) 18:00, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

After the extant RFCs close, yes. It'd be good not to have to talk about this for a while. Simonm223 (talk) 18:01, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I a gree with Simonmn223 here. One the RfCs close, set those in stone for 6-12 months. If we can just eliminate these pointless discussions over political position/ideology, it might be easier for people to communicate concerns about literally anything else.Toa Nidhiki05 18:17, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Support because things can change with time, see WP:RECENTISM. I have my own, relatively unorthodox views on ideology and positions for the Republican Party.
The truth is, notwithstanding an RfC closure review, it's normal for the contents of an RfC to be considered decided for at least six months. Simonm223 (talk) 20:16, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
We can't shut down debate on topics even if there was a recent RfC about it. Doing so would be WP:LOCALCON, and new RfC's are permitted even if one was recently made on the same or a similar topic. BootsED (talk) 14:59, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. Please. Can we have a discussion about literally anything else? Please? Carlp941 (talk) 20:21, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Right-wing

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The infobox says the party is "center-right to right-wing" which is the same categorization as the Conservatives (UK) and the GOP is to the right of the Tories, in my view it should be only right-wing. 189.76.128.100 (talk) 18:26, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Please see the RFC above—it discusses essentially what you are proposing. RiverMan18 (talk) 18:41, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Please see the RFC above—it discusses essentially what you are proposing. RiverMan18 (talk) 03:44, 8 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Comment We use the standards of the country and time period, along with academic sources. There is no universal standard or cross-country comparison. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 21:17, 8 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Correction: We only use academic standards. We do not use the standards of the country and time period except when the academic consensus does likewise. Simonm223 (talk) 13:32, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There is no academic consensus that the Republican Party is center-right. Currently, the infobox cites three sources for using that designation. One of them is clearly outdated, being from 2015 and before Trumpism took over the party. Of the two sources published after Trump's ascendancy, one flat-out admits that the party is "an outlier" amongst Anglosphere political parties that are considered center-right and caters more to its extremist elements than is typical for the rest. These are not good sources to justify the "center-right" label in the infobox. TKSnaevarr (talk) 16:59, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There is already a discussion about this going on. You can contribute there EarthDude (talk) 18:28, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Simonm223 We use academic sources, which incorporate the standards of the country and time period. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 01:06, 21 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
We use academic sources and a global standard, instead of using separate standards for separate countries EarthDude (talk) 18:24, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
We can compare to the global standard but they are stated in relation to their country and time period. For instance Democrats would be considered right wing in most of western Europe but we state they are Center-left in their infobox because by the American politics standards they are. So yes, they are separated standards per country. PackMecEng (talk) 14:37, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't go as far as calling the Dems right-wing by European standards, theyre more center-right by European standards. I think the Wiki page for the Dems should be changed from calling em center left to a centrist party, cuz thats what it is, by the global standard, as they mix right-wing economics (except for the center-left bernie-AOC progressive faction of the party) with generally progressive social policies. EarthDude (talk) 11:02, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Trumpism vs Republican Party: What's the difference?

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Trumpism runs the Republican party in its current form (I think it's fair to say that's an objective fact). Therefore, the political positions of the Republican Party must logically include all the political positions of Trumpism. The Republican party could contain positions that are not a part of Trumpism (center-right), but logically if Trumpism includes far-right, then the Republican party must also include far-right. The ideology should therefore read "center-right to far-right". Joejoe1864 (talk) 00:41, 9 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

"far-right" has been discussed and rejected million times, see previous discussions 62.217.185.179 (talk) 12:51, 9 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
But parties can change over time. Clearly the party has moved further to the right over time, so previous discussions are outdated. Joejoe1864 (talk) 19:17, 9 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly what are you proposing for this article? GoodDay (talk) 19:31, 9 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There is an open RfC already about whether to include "far-right" in the infobox. I'd suggest you make your comments there rather than starting a new thread. Simonm223 (talk) 13:31, 10 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm proposing that it should be updated to indicate that "far-right" has become more prominent in the party recently. Old discussions about this are irrelevant because the party has moved further to the right recently. Joejoe1864 (talk) 21:15, 14 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I agree that at the national level, Trump for all intents and purposes is the one in charge, with very little leadership or pushback from other Republicans per RS. But I don't support including far-right, because there have been RfC's on including far-right on Trump's own article and his political positions, and those have been unsuccessful.
  • Also there are lots of Republicans at the state-level, and they legislate and govern independently of Trump and the national level. I don't agree, nor do RS, that those Republicans are just rubber stamps for Trump. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 00:18, 11 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Prior RfCs don’t change WP:VERIFY. Please, please rethink your use of original interpretations of situations independent of any policy. You’ve been asked repeatedly by editors to stick to policy based editing rather than personal opinion or WP:OR, and you said you would, and here we are again. Whatever you believe to be the case, it needs sources backing it up. That also means you need to evaluate the evidence presented in RfCs and not just look at old ones and go “well, nothing changed last time.” This is not how Wikipedia works. Warrenᚋᚐᚊᚔ 10:08, 11 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
if you agree, that Repiblicans at the state level are just trump's puppets, you are the one, who is supposed to bring a source (reliable) supporting thic claim. And the most recent RFC about inclusion of "far-right" dates back to february 10. And it was, again, rejected 5.35.115.191 (talk) 16:52, 13 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Don't State level GOP Parties have their own pages with separate infoboxes? 131.96.221.223 (talk) 15:42, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Unless there's an actual proposal being made. This discussion appears to be breaching WP:NOTFORUM, tbh. GoodDay (talk) 17:39, 13 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Historical ideology mabye?

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You should mabye add the Historical belifes of both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party considering the party flips, since it can be a bit miss leading when people find for example a pogressive historical figure and they then are a member of the Republican Party or the opposite. 78.69.116.184 (talk) 13:01, 13 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That information is currently integrated into the history section. Improvements are, of course, welcome. Simonm223 (talk) 13:13, 13 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with @Simonm223 that the history section can incorporate historical ideologies, of which there have been numerous. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 23:03, 19 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

RfC: Can we incorporate the Roberts Court's decisions into discussions of right-wing and far-right?

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If there's one place where the Republican Party's shift to the right has been much clearer, absent electoral results (SCOTUS justices aren't elected), it has been the Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Roberts. Aside from Dobbs, I have RS documenting how the SCOTUS has become extremely partisan and right-wing in recent years with Trump's appointments. Partisan is in the sense that its members have predictable ideologies based on the president that appointed them, which is far different from the past, despite what many might assume. I was editing the Roberts Court article today, and thought it might be relevant.

The SCOTUS isn't "right-wing populist," in that it doesn't need to campaign or appeal to voters. None of the justices are wearing MAGA hats or being populist, they're just deciding cases. It helps provide a perspective on how the Republican Party has changed since Trump beyond merely elected officials in my view.

  • But it has shifted much further to the right post-Trump, with the more recent 2024 Trump v. United States presidential immunity decision being a good example. Would these sources and others be useful for incorporating into the party's ideology, with the second source of Nine Black Robes: Inside the Supreme Court's Drive to the Right and Its Historic Consequences being a good example.
  • Partisan means "a committed member of a political party who strongly supports their party's policies and are reluctant to compromise with political opponents." [1][2] JohnAdams1800 (talk) 01:12, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Can you explain how all of this relevant? And to what is it relevant? Be more concise, please. Paul Vaurie (talk) 02:52, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The Supreme Court has been just as transformed as the rest of American politics in the Trump era (2016-present). And given the Supreme Court is dominated by Republican appointees (6-3), and the nature of its recent rulings (i.e. Dobbs, Trump immunity case, voter suppression and gerrymandering, etc.), it helps provide support with RS that the Republican Party is ideologically no longer center-right as a significant component of its political position.
  • The Supreme Court is likely the very last "establishment" faction of the Republican Party, given Trump can't fire its members. And it has largely enabled Trump and Republicans, while shifting to the right.
The Supreme Court isn't an elected institution, and isn't "right-wing populist," given its job is just to decide cases. I have RS that it is partisan, and ideologically right-wing. The Supreme Court's job is to decide cases, and the nature of its decisions provides strong evidence that the Republican Party has largely lost its moderate and center-right faction. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 05:09, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The Court is right-wing populist if RS describe it as such, and isn't if they don't.
Regarding the actual question: it's probably appropriate to include in the article that the judges voted for by GOP representatives have drifted further and further right, sourcing pending, naturally. Cortador (talk) 16:10, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The 2020s SCOTUS highlights the sheer scale of the ideological polarization between the two parties and the Republican Party's further shift to the right. Here are some examples:
  • As the Vox article says, there was once a time when Republican nominees were pro-abortion (i.e. Anthony Kennedy, Sandra Day O'Connor, David Souter, and John Paul Stevens), not to mention Roe's author Harry Blackmun was appointed by Richard Nixon.
  • Compare United States v. Nixon (1974) with Trump v. United States (2024) on presidential immunity and conduct.
I'm not a lawyer, but the sheer contrast in the SCOTUS of the time of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan/George H.W. Bush to Trump's time is astounding.
I can bring more RS if necessary, but today's SCOTUS was confirmed by Republicans and Democrats for ideological purity. Beyond specific issues, another RS quote here couldn't better describe the current SCOTUS:
  • "The Republicans changed from being a right of centre coalition of moderates and conservatives to an unambiguously right-wing party that was hostile not only to liberal views but also to any perspective that clashed with the core views of an ideologically cohesive conservative cadre of party faithfuls."[3] JohnAdams1800 (talk) 21:30, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
While SCOTUS isn't exactly mutually exclusive to either party, I think this is an interesting question, that largely depends on the amount of coverage by RS on the matter. Is the Roberts court a fair and accurate reflection of the Republican party? Tune in next week ;-) Cheers. DN (talk) 05:15, 23 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Why is there no RFC tag? GoodDay (talk) 16:33, 24 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I was too lazy to put the RFC tag. This is a "Request for Comment" to discuss the Republican-dominated SCOTUS, not really about an editing dispute. If there's one place where it's clearest that the Republican Party has shifted to the right, it's the SCOTUS.
  • I help maintain the judicial appointment history for U.S. federal courts. As one example, the Roe court in 1973 was 6-3 Republican, and the Casey court in 1993 was 8-1 Republican. Roe's author was Harry Blackmun, appointed by Richard Nixon. There are other decisions and issues too.
All four appointees of Trump and Biden were confirmed very narrowly: Gorsuch 54-45, Kavanaugh 50-48, Barrett 52-48, and Jackson 53-47. It's a powerful sign of the times, both of the Republican Party shifting to the right and partisan polarization in general. (Antonin Scalia was confirmed 98-0, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg 96-3 for reference.)
In my view the Roberts Court cannot be described as "center-right," both with respect to its decisions on say abortion but also RS describing how it has contributed to democratic backsliding. And the Roberts Court has been described as both extremely partisan and also enabled by elected Republican officials, making it a strong sign that center-right should be removed.
Link: Judicial appointment history for United States federal courts#Supreme Court JohnAdams1800 (talk) 02:16, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Without the tag, you're not going to get a lot of input. GoodDay (talk) 16:46, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
See Bush v. Gore 2001. Five Republican SC justices awarded the 2000 election to the Republican presidential candidate. Republicans led by Roger Stone (Yes, that Roger Stone!) had impeded the vote count during the Brooks Brothers riot. There's noting new. TFD (talk) 17:13, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

References

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References

  1. ^ "We should call the Republican justices "Republicans" and not "conservatives"". Vox. October 5, 2024. Retrieved February 22, 2025. Nor have Democrats failed to police their own nominees' ideological conformity. None of the Supreme Court justices appointed by presidents Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, or Joe Biden broke with the Democratic Party's approach to judging in the same way that Souter broke from the GOP's. ... Democrats' vetting process, meanwhile, is more informal. But it's been no less successful in identifying Supreme Court nominees who reliably embrace their party's stance on the most contentious issues. The last Democrat appointed to the Supreme Court who broke with the party's pro-abortion rights stance, for example, was Justice Byron White — a dissenter in Roe v. Wade appointed by President John F. Kennedy in 1962. ... The result is a modern-day Supreme Court where every single member was carefully selected by their party to ensure that they will not stray on any of the issues where the two parties have settled views. ... The Republican justices, in other words, behave just like Republicans in other policymaking roles. They sometimes disagree with their fellow Republicans on important issues, but they also share a broad theory of governance, as well as a fairly granular agenda that includes (among other things) eliminating the constitutional right to an abortion, implementing a "colorblind" theory of the Constitution, and centralizing regulatory authority in the judicial branch of government. ... We should call the Republican justices "Republicans," and the Democratic justices "Democrats," because that is the best way to educate our readers about how the modern-day Supreme Court actually functions.
  2. ^ Biskupic, Joan (April 4, 2023). "Nine Black Robes: Inside the Supreme Court's Drive to the Right and Its Historic Consequences". Retrieved February 22, 2025. Nine Black Robes displays the inner maneuverings among the Supreme Court justices that led to the seismic reversal of Roe v. Wade and a half century of women's abortion rights. Biskupic details how rights are stripped away or, alternatively as in the case of gun owners, how rights are expanded. Today's bench—with its conservative majority—is desperately ideological. The Court has been headed rightward and ensnared by its own intrigues for years, but the Trump appointments hastened the modern transformation. With unparalleled access to key players, Biskupic shows the tactics of each justice and reveals switched votes and internal pacts that typically never make the light of day, yet will have repercussions for generations to come.
  3. ^ McKay, David (2020), Crewe, Ivor; Sanders, David (eds.), "Facilitating Donald Trump: Populism, the Republican Party and Media Manipulation", Authoritarian Populism and Liberal Democracy, Cham: Springer International Publishing, pp. 107–121, doi:10.1007/978-3-030-17997-7_7, ISBN 978-3-030-17997-7, retrieved 2024-06-13, the Republicans changed from being a right of centre coalition of moderates and conservatives to an unambiguously right-wing party that was hostile not only to liberal views but also to any perspective that clashed with the core views of an ideologically cohesive conservative cadre of party faithfuls

New ideology

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Anti-Atlanticism
Anti-Ukrainian sentiment 2001:1C01:4009:D00:18CC:615D:5326:C030 (talk) 17:17, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

These are certainly categories, but do not merit individual ideologies. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 17:29, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Republican's stance on anti-Atlanticism and anti-Ukrainian sentiment. 2001:1C01:4009:D00:18CC:615D:5326:C030 (talk) 17:40, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I do love it when I click a link and it immediately cites Samuel P. Huntington who is pretty thoroughly discredited. 17:46, 25 February 2025 (UTC) Simonm223 (talk) 17:46, 25 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The appropriate term is "obsolete", not "discredited". JacktheBrown (talk) 14:35, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Historical position

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I think we should include a historical political position (Center to Center-left) and do the same on the Democrats (Right-wing) AstrowszechwiatWKG (talk) 17:13, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose because it really depends on the time period. We have the history section for that. Also the Solid South was often entirely separate from the non-Southern Democratic Party until the 1970s. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 19:43, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It is anachronistic to use political terms for periods before they were used in the U.S. or in many cases anywhere. In any case, both parties had supporters right across the political spectrum until from FDR to Reagan they reoriented along left-right lines. TFD (talk) 20:23, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@The Four Deuces One interesting event was that in 1938, FDR tried to purge many conservative Democrats from the party, and mostly failed.
Source: Roosevelt's Purge: How FDR Fought to Change the Democratic Party JohnAdams1800 (talk) 22:51, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@JohnAdams1800: we should add this reliable source within one or more articles. JacktheBrown (talk) 14:42, 28 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This is a very good source. It might be more relevant at Democratic Party (United States) but if it has significant material on the Republicans it should certainly be usable here too. Simonm223 (talk) 14:46, 28 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with the use of this source in both articles. JacktheBrown (talk) 15:13, 28 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@JacktheBrown @Simonm223 I read the book while writing my Masterpiece article, Solid South. The main thing I got out of the book was that Southern Democrats were very conservative even by the standards of their time, and allied with conservative Republicans to form the conservative coalition.
  • The book doesn't cover much about the Republican Party. It's mainly about how Southern Democrats were really just a regionalist party that were generally ideologically conservative. The Southern United States has never been a progressive or liberal region for the most part. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 15:22, 28 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Ok but just add a historical position, FDR was definetely left-wing, just saying it would be cool to add a historical position
Also i primarily mean the 1800s AstrowszechwiatWKG (talk) 17:21, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
FDR was left-wing in the sense of the Old Left, not the New Left. FDR said “I am a Christian and a Democrat.” FDR permitted the Jim Crow South, though his New Deal and World War II helped lay the groundwork for the end of the Jim Crow South. (I wrote over half of the Solid South article.)
Neutral - Only if it's done for the Republican Party article. GoodDay (talk) 04:33, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Should we change libertarianism into libertarian conservatism?

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They're a damn ton of paleo-libertarian/libertarian conservatives elements and adjacent factions of the republican party but there are no more socially libertine factions in the republican party, there was a temporary boost in the 2000s to 2017 but that's about it most libertarians that vote have shifted to the right on so many social issues and those issues really tend to be more authoritarian which could a good or bad thing but isn't something of liberty without the additional caveat of "well urm they're moreso socially conservative libertarians" Elon and Doge is a good citation for the rise in paleo libertarianism as well as close connections to Milei so the libertarian stuff isn't completely gone I imagine Kedamomo999 (talk) 03:57, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

No, because that is not the proper term for this, Mangoflies (talk) 05:55, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes it is, its socially conservative libertarianism Pogchampange (talk) 21:42, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The question is, what do the sources say? Will Thorpe (talk) 00:11, 28 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Merge proposal

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Lack of understanding of Wikipedia's purpose

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Moxy🍁 03:53, 28 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I propose merging Republican Party (United States) into Political parties in the united states. I think that having seperate articles just for each political party is unnecessary, and things just overlap. Mangoflies (talk) 05:41, 27 February 2025 (UTC) [reply]

Misunderstanding solved
What does wanting to merge a disambiguation article into another, have to do with this article? GoodDay (talk) 05:43, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
that could be a potention, consoldating all of the different parties into one article Mangoflies (talk) 05:44, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
What? GoodDay (talk) 05:46, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
you edited your comment. Mangoflies (talk) 05:48, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
What does "potention" & "consoldating" mean? GoodDay (talk) 05:50, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
potential. Consolidating? to join together into one whole, Mangoflies (talk) 05:53, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Firstly, please don't just edit your comments. You changed it so my reply was different. What do you mean by "have to do with this article". This is the talk page for the article that will be merged. This is where it said to have the discussion Mangoflies (talk) 05:47, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think you're a tad confused about which Republican Party article, you're linking to. Read of your first post. GoodDay (talk) 05:49, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The GOP party.
We are on the talk page for that article. I don't know what you mean by "Read of your first post" Mangoflies (talk) 05:51, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Why did you link to Republican Party? GoodDay (talk) 05:52, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
because that is the party. The GOP, republican party. Are you based in the US? Mangoflies (talk) 05:54, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I see you've fixed the link. Thanks. GoodDay (talk) 05:57, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Political position factions

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Majority: Right wing

Factions: centre to Far Right

It already essentially of says this with the [B] on political position. But this would be an aesthetic improvement to the formatting. In my opinion. Thoughts ? 69.120.198.205 (talk) 23:31, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Centre-right

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Last time i visited this article, republican party's political position was centre-right to right-wing. Now, some guy edited this article and removed centre-right position, making republican party just right wing. I havent seen any consensus on this talk page to remove centre right position from this article. I propose that the centre-right position be added back and the user who changed it without permission be warned. Thank you. 81.9.127.73 (talk) 12:31, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like it was removed by Willthorpe here. But it looks like an active RFC was discussing the topic and it probably should not of been changed. It should probably be restored pending a close. PackMecEng (talk) 14:46, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The edit was made during a brief period when the relevant RfC was closed by an IP editor who made an account to close the RfC. Willthorpe's good faith change was after the closing. I reverted the closing as it was done before the RfC had run 30 days and it was done by an account with 4 edits. I didn't revert the article level change for the sake of stability since I assumed that will be the outcome in the end anyway. Springee (talk) 18:10, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Ah I missed the strange timeline on that. My mistake, though it should be status quo until it is closed. PackMecEng (talk) 18:46, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I will admit my edit had nothing to do with the discussion closure which apparently lined up with it. I had a few days prior reverted a previous change to the article suggesting we wait a little longer. When I did implement the change myself, I attached a footnote which I hoped in combination with the change would accomodate all concerns. My justification for the footnote is below. Will Thorpe (talk) 23:21, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
A long discussion between editors had been going on regarding this, and a clear consensus had been reached. The edit changing from center-right to right-wing follows that consensus EarthDude (talk) 17:25, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Political position footnote

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I have attached a footnote to to the 'Political position' section of the infobox, the footnote reading as follows:

Parts of the Republican Party have been described as centrist, center-right, and far-right.

I wish to justify this and offer other editors a chance to express their opinion on this resolution of the disputes which have transpired over how the GOP's political position should be described.

Each of these terms I have attributed to reliable, recent sources. Each term is, I believe, widely applied enough to sufficiently relevant sections of the GOP to negate the criticism which may arise from WP:UNDUE – as does the fact this acknowledgment of the GOP's fuller ideological spectrum has been relegated to a footnote.

A clear majority of editors in a recent discussion supported the removal of 'center-right' from the 'political position' section of the infobox but there was some opposition and there were attempts to find a middle ground option.

I have taken care to add three sources for 'far right' compared to two each for the other options in reflection that this term may be more contentious, but each term must be supported.

There is comparable practice concerning political positioning, with nuances relegated to a footnote, in the articles for the United States Democratic Party and the Liberal Party of Australia.

Will Thorpe (talk) 22:53, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I will note further – the footnote merely posits that sections of the party are described this way, which is true in reliable sources. It allows for disagreement. Will Thorpe (talk) 23:23, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Not that I disagree with the logic of your request, but given that EarthDude has reverted your addition, the proper thing to do is follow WP:BRD. You do not have consensus to add this footnote AFAIK. Please revert and discuss here. Cheers. DN (talk) 01:35, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The purpose of an info-box is to get readers key facts at a glance. Having footnotes defeats the purpose. If information is nuanced, then it belongs in the body of the article, not the info-box. Also, you should avoid the passive tense per Wikipedia:Weasel. TFD (talk) 02:11, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Footnotes are justified when their exclusion obscures rather than illuminates. This is the case here. As I stated, other articles offer a precedent. Will Thorpe (talk) 11:50, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Could you please cite the policy or guideline where that appears? The purpose of the MOS:INFOBOX is "allowing readers to identify key facts at a glance." There's nothing about footnotes which defeats the point of any info-box. TFD (talk) 12:53, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I am confused. That seems to prove my point! Did you mis-write? By the way, I am happy to avoid the passive tense in a re-write. Will Thorpe (talk) 09:01, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Imagine you are a reader who sees the Republican Party mentioned in a news article, you know nothing about it and come to this article for a brief overview. Maybe you live in Australia and you want to know if it is more similar to the Liberal or Labor parties. A quick glance of the info-box should tell you. You are not going to look at the footnotes or follow the external links.
OTOH, if you want detailed information about the party, there's a whole article to read with a table of contents helping you find whatever aspect interest you. TFD (talk) 10:29, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The footnotes might just help you, particularly when considering the GOP has historically been termed a 'big tent'. Footnotes are sometimes important for clarification, and yes, provide basic information at a glance. Will Thorpe (talk) 07:19, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I reverted the change because it is WP:UNDUE. For example, the two sources used for centrist are just news sources, but both center right and far right have a journal as a source in addition to news sources. I think its is an unnecessary addition to the infobox, and it gives equal weight to unequal viewpoints. The case is different for the Trumpism footnote because Trumpism is a big enough ideology/movement to be clarified with the footnote. The footnote for the democratic party is also just a helpful clarity thing. I do feel somewhat iffy about the footnote in the australian liberal party, and think it is kind of unnecessary but i dont know much about australian politics and also, i think removing that footnote would need a discussion, so i wont remove it now EarthDude (talk) 09:01, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I am agreeable to removing 'centrist' and simply having 'center-right' and 'far-right', but at least these warrant inclusion and as you stated have academic sources supporting them. It does not suggest they are necessarily equal and I must stress this is besides the question. It does not matter if 'far-right' and 'center-right' are equal in prevalence; it only matters if reliable sources sufficiently back their inclusion, and they do. Their relegation to the footnote indicates they are of less significance than the party's broad right-wing alignment, but they still provide important clarification.
It would not be difficult to find additional reliable sources to support these terms.
Will Thorpe (talk) 11:55, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You will still need consensus. Cheers. DN (talk) 12:03, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough. I thought inclusion of the footnote may be acceptable as a bold step to resolve an ongoing discussion in accordance with the majority wish but also negating the concerns of a minority in a way that to me appears reasonable. I hope to gain agreement to reinstate a similar footnote.
If I am unable to attain that through this thread, I will start a formal RfC. Will Thorpe (talk) 09:03, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Please make sure to use WP:RFCBEFORE. Cheers. DN (talk) 10:34, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion: Can we call the Republican Party's foreign policy as Russophilia and opposed to Ukraine?

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I really don't know how else to describe it, given the 2025 Trump–Zelenskyy meeting. Foreign policy is done only at the federal level, and mainly by the President. It's extremely clear that Trump is a Russophile who opposes foreign aid and military security guarantees to Ukraine.

Title: The World Trump Wants; American Power in the New Age of Nationalism Link: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/world-trump-wants-michael-kimmage

  • Quote: "In the two decades that followed the Cold War’s end [1990-2010], globalism gained ground over nationalism. Simultaneously, the rise of increasingly complex systems and networks—institutional, financial, and technological—overshadowed the role of the individual in politics. But in the early 2010s, a profound shift began. By learning to harness the tools of this century, a cadre of charismatic figures revived the archetypes of the previous one: the strong leader, the great nation, the proud civilization. ... The shift arguably began in Russia. In 2012, Vladimir Putin ended a short experiment during which he left the presidency and spent four years as prime minister while a compliant ally served as president. Putin returned to the top job and consolidated his authority, crushing all opposition and devoting himself to rebuilding “the Russian world,” restoring the great-power status that had evaporated with the fall of the Soviet Union, and resisting the dominance of the United States and its allies. Two years later, Xi Jinping made it to the top in China. His aims were like Putin’s but far grander in scale—and China had far greater capabilities. In 2014, Narendra Modi, a man with vast aspirations for India, completed his long political ascent to the prime minister’s office and established Hindu nationalism as his country’s dominant ideology. That same year, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who had spent just over a decade as Turkey’s hard-driving prime minister, became its president. In short order, Erdogan transformed his country’s factionalized democratic ensemble into an autocratic one-man show. Perhaps the most consequential moment in this evolution occurred in 2016, when Donald Trump won the presidency of the United States." JohnAdams1800 (talk) 01:13, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it's true that individuals are now having more of an impact on policy in those countries than parties. Specifically, in the US, the Republican Party no longer really has a policy or, if it does, it's irrelevant. What Trump says and does is the only effective policy. I know we've always talked about parties having policies, but it really doesn't make any sense to say that now in the case of the Republican Party in the US. HiLo48 (talk) 01:28, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
So that's why at least 6 senators and over a dozen total members of Congress that are in the GOP have come out against Trump's tirade in the meeting? Get real. To claim that Trump = GOP is a flagrant violation of neutral point of view and is borderline an attempt to use Wikipedia to prove a point in the real world. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 02:27, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You should take other people's comments in WP:GOODFAITH, instead of immediately attacking them for supposed and seemingly baseless WP:RGW EarthDude (talk) 15:19, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You can't take one person's opinion and express it as fact. I noticed btw that the text you quote at length does not mention the Republican Party, which is the topic of this article. TFD (talk) 02:17, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That's the point. In accepting Trump as their presidential candidate, the entire party has said that whatever Trump says and does is fine and IS Republican policy. If they don't really believe that, they should have said something earlier. HiLo48 (talk) 04:00, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That's not how WP:OR works, sources have to explicitly draw the conclusions presented in the article, editors aren't allowed to draw their own conclusions or to read between the lines. – GlowstoneUnknown (Talk) 12:50, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not doing OR. My main point was how the Republican Party, with foreign policy mainly conducted by Trump as POTUS, has dramatically changed its foreign policy positions. The Republican Party is now pro-tariffs, pro-Russia, anti-Ukraine, anti-multilateralism and "America First," anti-interventionist, etc.
The quoted source is about this being a new age of nationalist leaders, who are destroying the old neoliberal/multilateral order that had lasted from around 1990 to the 2010s. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 14:15, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The lengthy quote does not mention the Republican Party. Per Wikipedia:No original research, "Do not combine material from multiple sources to state or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources."
Your source does not say that Trump has changed the Republican Party and therefore what they write about Trump applies to the party. It does not matter if that happens to be true, but whether or not the source implicitly says that. TFD (talk) 18:07, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@The Four Deuces The source was about the broader changes in global politics, of which Trump is part of. Its purpose was to characterize Trump and his foreign policy, not the Republican Party as a whole. Foreign policy is conducted mainly by the POTUS, as head of state and government. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 19:08, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
In that case, it does not belong in this article. TFD (talk) 19:13, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
No, we can't. It is not NPOV to try and put the views of the current executive (the President and administration officials) on the party as a whole. There are at least 6 GOP senators that have openly come out since that meeting on Friday against the view of Trump/Rubio/etc. just as an example. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 02:26, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"mainly conducted by Trump as POTUS, has dramatically changed its foreign policy positions" The organ grinder plays the tune, the trained monkeys dance to the tune. That is how party discipline usually works. The party members obey the policies of the party leader, or they will be kicked out of the party in the next political purge. Business as usual. Dimadick (talk) 05:42, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Did they do any more than just talk? HiLo48 (talk) 04:01, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There are many RS stating that just talk, and don't take action. They are just rubber stamps for Trump's agenda, which often wildly deviates from what was once Republican orthodoxy.
Link: https://www.ft.com/content/843b18e3-7f37-4a82-8c5c-c2875a49c2c8 ; The US Congress is missing in action JohnAdams1800 (talk) 19:03, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
At least one of those senators (Lisa Murkowsi) voted for a resolution that falsely claimed that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, despite knowing there was no evidence for this. There is no policy that says Republican senators are beacons of truth. TFD (talk) 13:11, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That might be problematic. GoodDay (talk) 03:51, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The point of the source and quote was to put Trump in context, which is with nationalist leaders arising in the 2010s like Putin, Xi, Modi, Erdogan, etc. Regarding foreign policy, there are many RS that Trump has changed the Republican Party's foreign policy to be "America First" and clearly pro-Russia and anti-Ukraine. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 12:54, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Foreign Policy Magazine likely constitutes a reliable source, but the quote provided doesn't indicate that the Republican party has become more pro-Russia, instead it indicates Trump's election is significant as a movement in the United States toward nationalism. I know that there is academic material about the alliance between conservative political groups that drew out ties between the contemporary Republican party and Russia. Solar Politics by Oxana Timofeeva might have something about this although I can't remember off the top of my head how explicit she was. I'll look later. Simonm223 (talk) 14:33, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The rhetoric has changed, but then both George W. Bush and Obama praised and helped Putin. I looked into his eyes and saw his soul. Mitt, the eighties called: they want their foreign policy back. Trump was more harsh on Putin in his first term than any other U.S. president. As for Ukraine, wars end. Biden ended the war in Afghanistan, returning the Taliban to power. Was that a change in foreign policy?
At present, we don't know what direction foreign policy will take. All we have are opinions. They are worth including, but none can be taken as fact. TFD (talk) 14:38, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
(short phone edit) John, I think there are issues with your recent edits. First, I didn't think we should say the party opposed aid to Ukraine. I think it's clear the president and his circle want to change/scale back support but that isn't the same as oppose. Also it's not clear if Trump is Russiaphile or trying to be conciliatory to end a war. Given we are dealing with unfolding events we should be very cautious about direct statements such as this [3]. Springee (talk) 14:50, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I support this. The current administration and the Republican Party as a whole has shown itself to be remarkably Russophile and Ukrainophobe EarthDude (talk) 15:16, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I was mistaken about Solar Politics having supporting material. I also checked Tari's There is no unhappy revolution which also was a wash - odd as I was sure I read something relevant in one of those two books. Oh well, I suppose I misremembered. Simonm223 (talk) 18:56, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Noting that JohnAdams1800 has attempted to make these edits to change "is divided on" to opposes aid for Ukraine in the lead and also to explicitly add the term "russophile" to the article while this discussion is ongoing with non-insignificant opposition/concern. This article is about the Republican Party, not Trump, Vance, or any other individual. While it may be appropriate to report on individual members of the party (such as the President's recent meeting with Zelensky and the aftermath of that), it is not appropriate to try to shoehorn individuals' views into this article that are clearly strongly disputed within the party. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 23:47, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This issue is a hill I am willing to (figuratively) die on. The Russian invasion of Ukraine was illegal under international law and Putin has engaged in crimes against humanity. Trump is engaging in historical negationism and Russophilia with respect to it.The only Republicans to whom foreign policy is applicable is at the federal level, and particularly the POTUS as head of state and government. (Unlike say abortion legislated at the state level, or tax policy written by congressional Republicans.) Trump is clearly a Russophile and a Ukrainophobe.
It doesn't matter what the views are within the party, rather it matters whose views actually carry out policies. Ronald Reagan opposed the Soviet Union and Communism, while Donald Trump supports Russia and right-wing nationalism/populism.JohnAdams1800 (talk) 23:55, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
me - Some individual Republicans may have expressed a different view, but the party has given Trump absolute power over party policy. Whatever he says simply IS party policy for all practical purposes. HiLo48 (talk) 00:11, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Even if that's the case, sources should be found to back up each claim individually without having to fall back on the transitive property, i.e. "Trump's the party leader, he's against immigration[exampleref], ergo the party is anti-immigration". Any of these sources describing Trump's personal views and policies can be included on the Donald Trump or the Political views of Donald Trump page/s, just because he's a prominent member of the Republican Party doesn't mean his views are synonymous with the party's views. – GlowstoneUnknown (Talk) 00:25, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
But they are! The "party" as an entity is not displaying any position on anything that differs from what Trump says. HiLo48 (talk) 00:48, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Then it shouldn't be difficult to find sources in support of JohnAdams' edits. – GlowstoneUnknown (Talk) 00:50, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I have no idea what John Adams has written. I am simply commenting on this discussion on the Talk page. You seem more concerned about another editor. To me, this is WP:BLUESKY stuff. HiLo48 (talk) 00:56, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The party as an entity is the sum of its members. If there is no official position, then it is not proper to assume that one of the positions supported by some of the members, no matter how significant those members' positions are, is the position of the party. That is inappropriate WP:SYNTH and very far from "the sky is blue". -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 00:58, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Even when, for all practical purposes, it is? HiLo48 (talk) 01:08, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You're free to have that opinion. Unless it's their official position (which could be sourced to their platform under WP:ABOUTSELF), then you need reliable sources that say it's their position. Otherwise, it's inappropriate WP:SYNTH. The only sources presented so far are that Trump and a few others have a view, not that the party as a whole has that view as a whole. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 01:10, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
OK, where DO I go to find the party's official position on things? HiLo48 (talk) 01:14, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Should that be interpreted as a threat to edit war if you don't get your way? Regardless of your beliefs or how "wrong" it is, Wikipedia is not for you to try to right great wrongs in the world. This article is about the party, so it certainly does matter what the views are within the party. Not what the views of one or a few members only of the party are. And whether or not they have the legal ability to do anything about it, if they are a prominent member of the party, their views are a part of the party. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 00:13, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The editor-in-question has been page-blocked. GoodDay (talk) 01:21, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I have been working on finding some sources that might support this claim or one similar to it. Here's what I've found so far.
  1. Betraying Ukraine Commonweal. Mar2024, Vol. 151 Issue 3, p5-5. 1p. Other figures on the Right have adopted Trump's admiring attitude toward Putin. In an interview with the Russian president, Tucker Carlson encouraged Putin to advance a deluded historical justification for the invasion and asked no questions about Russian war crimes or Putin's authoritarian crackdown on dissent. When questioned about his favorable treatment of Putin, Carlson said, "Leadership requires killing people." A few days later, news broke of the death in prison of Putin's most prominent critic, Aleksei Navalny. Asked to comment on Carlson's interview, Republican senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin said, "Take things with a grain of salt, but a lot of the points that Vladimir Putin made are accurate."
    Of course, there remains an old guard in the Republican Party—represented by Nikki Haley, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell, and Sen. Mitt Romney—that rejects MAGA isolationism and clings to the party's pre-Trump interventionism, but it has become a clear minority.     Opinion piece. Should not be used without attribution.
  2. How Putin Co-Opted the Republican Party. By: Elliott, Philip, Time.com, 24762679, 2/23/2024 And Republicans have gone along with all of it. They looked the other way on intelligence breaches, and failed to convict Trump during a record two impeachment trials. And, even in the face of evidence that their impeachment payback of Biden is based on an FBI informant now indicted for telling lies that he alleges started in Russia to hurt Biden, House Republicans say they'll plow forward regardless. The fact that the cornerstone of their case against Biden originated with Russian spooks and bogus claims of checks sent to Biden family members from Ukraine is inconsequential in their march to help Trump's chances of returning to Washington. And as Ukraine struggles in its fight against Russia, it seems those Republicans are ready to abandon the former Soviet republic because Trump has a grudge.
    It's quite an act of intentional forgetting on the part of the Republican Party to set aside their lionized legend of Reagan in service of another TV talent, one who seems to hold Reagan-era precedents in contempt and share little of his admiration for democracy. Yet this is the current work of a large cut of the contemporary GOP. For a lot of conservatives, it has not been easy to get over their first crush, but they have another charismatic figure at the ready. Or at least one refusing to retreat.     Opinion piece. Should not be used without attribution.
  3. This one actually contradicts the claim that the Republican party, rather than just Trump, is Russophilic - albeit quite weakly. No real pull quote that puts the hammer to the nail. I'm including it in the review to demonstrate there isn't a uniform consensus on this but don't think it's that useful as, despite the promise of the headline, it's quite ambivalent and doesn't end up saying much in any sort of assertive way. Republican Lawmaker Breaks Ranks to Defy Trump Over Ukraine. By: McBride, Courtney, Bloomberg.com, 2/20/2025
  4. The Religious Right and Russia: Christian Nationalism and Americans' Views on Russia and Vladimir Putin Before and After the Ukrainian Invasion. By: Perry, Samuel L., Riccardi‐Swartz, Sarah, Davis, Joshua T., Grubbs, Joshua B., Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 00218294, Jun2023, Vol. 62, Issue 2 - this is a proper academic source. Its conclusion was that religious right support for Putin was curvilinear, dropping off both as people were less affiliated with Christian nationalism, then rising before falling again amongst the most extreme Christian nationalists. The hypothesis brought forward is that for Christian nationalists the promise of Putin to return Russia to an ethnonational state of Christian hegemony was seen as a good but for christian Nationaists, concerns over Russia as a geopolitical rival were more prevalent. On Republicans it says Despite long‐held suspicions toward Russia, certain political transformations in the former Soviet Union since perestroika have struck an ideological chord with many Americans on the cultural and political right. Especially since the ascendancy of Vladimir Putin, growing networks of conservative actors in the United States and abroad have drawn together the potential political futures of both countries (Riccardi‐Swartz [31]; Stoeckl and Uzlaner [34]). Since the mid‐2010s, conservative support for Russia has increased, with polls showing that Republicans, in particular, had warmed toward Russia and Putin leading up to the Ukrainian invasion in February 2022 (Gallup 2022; Huang and Cha [16]; Pew Research Center [28]; Reinhart [30]; Swift [35]). Although Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine has received bipartisan condemnation, several vocal leaders on the Christian far‐right have expressed support for Putin as they support other authoritarian leaders elsewhere (Olmstead [24]; Riccardi‐Swartz [32]).
I have to call it here for now because I'm out of time for source review for the day. Simonm223 (talk) 19:35, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If it's that hard to find the sources are we really following consensus vs searching to emphasize what we feel is correct? This is the problem with contemporary politics. We have an absence of real inside knowledge information and certainly no historical view on with which to assesses these claims. I think this is the sort of thing that should be left out until we see some sort of clear consensus on the party (not just Trump). Basically, err on the side of caution. Springee (talk) 19:54, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It's not that hard to find sources. It's just time consuming reading academic papers and periodicals. I stopped because I ran out of time, not papers to read. Please, by all means, jump on Wikipedia library and have a look at what you can see. Simonm223 (talk) 13:52, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I can cite policy and guidelines if required, but an article in a journal about religion is not an acceptable source for an article about the Republican Party. In any case, all it says is that Republicans "have warmed toward Russia and Putin" between 2012 and 2022.It doesn't go into further detail because the article is not about the Republican party's foreign policy and in fact does not mention it. TFD (talk) 19:59, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm being rather completionist in sharing what I've read on the topic - I would concur that specific source is a bit on the weak side as it is principally about the religious right and its commentary on the Republicans is slim, being limited to the quote I shared. If we found sufficient due sourcing for the claim it might still be usable as part of a bundled ref. I'm sure you know humanities and social sciences sources aren't always perfectly clean in their delineations of religion, politics, and society as the disciplines see them as interrelated phenomena. Simonm223 (talk) 13:56, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
No, we cannot. The lede as it looks now suffices. We should be cautious in responding to current events particularly when they upend established orthodoxy in the way Trump is doing. It is best to wait and see what sticks – and note there is still a considerable number of Republicans who support Ukraine. Will Thorpe (talk) 12:06, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Note also that the reliable sources provided support what the lede presently states; this proposed edit would change the article text so that it less closely follows the sources it cites. Will Thorpe (talk) 12:08, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Change for HRC and SRC?

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This was originally going to be a rebuttal to the RfC consensus to remove "center-right" from the infobox, but I'll just ask as a general question.

The Senate Republican Conference and House Republican Conference still retain their "center-right to right-wing" labels, which is understandable as people like Mitch McConnell and Lisa Murkowski still remain active in Congress. The only reason why the GOP in this page and the "List of political parties in the United States" page had their ideology changed was only due to one man: Trump. If both chambers of the Republican legislature are still deemed as "center-right," shouldn't that give us reason to retain the "center-right" position? Or should we change their infoboxes too, to just "right-wing"?

This is not to challenge the RfC, at least not yet. I'm just confused on where we draw the line in ideology for the subsets of the Republican Party, as a Republican myself. DougheGojiraMan (talk) 18:11, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Part of the challenge here is that a fair bit, but not by any means all of, the academic literature suggests that Republican voting preferences are such that there's no significant legislative space between the various party factions once the rubber hits the road. Rhetoric is rhetoric but if people vote with the US President 96-100% of the time then can we really categorize them as being ideologically distinct from him? This is, however, something where there is a lively debate within the academy. The decision to stick to just "right wing" that has been evolving was basically a recognition of that, combined with our need to summarize in the info box. Simonm223 (talk) 18:25, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The question then becomes does voting record equal viewpoints? Not necessarily. Politicians make deals all the time to vote for or against certain measures in exchange for another politician agreeing to vote for or against a measure. Furthermore, tactical voting exists even when there isn't an actual deal in place right now - it's entirely possible for some members of Congress to vote for legislation they don't support now to build political capital and be able to then go say "well, look, I voted with you on this other thing, but I just can't deal with this new bill in its current state" for something they consider more important later. I haven't a strong opinion on whether splitting out "center" and "far" is even appropriate in the first place to be quite honest, because I think it's better to be as general as possible to account for the wide range of viewpoints in each party.
And to reiterate, it's very common for party members in both parties, except for the absolute most extreme members, to "fall in line" and just vote with the party on a significant majority of legislation, especially when they are in power (i.e. control the legislative body, or have the presidency). -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 18:32, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If I were wearing my political philosophy hat I'd say that a materialist interpretation needs to prioritize deeds over rhetoric. Basically what's in the souls of Republican politicians is irrelevant - how we interpret them should depend on their deeds - and those deeds include participating in a political system where party whips are a thing. Of course being Wikipedia we need reliable sources to say that instead. Several have. Others disagree. Simonm223 (talk) 18:35, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Doesn't that go for both political parties? I think individual philosophies still exist within these people, especially after what McConnell, Murkowski and and Susan Collins pulled on Pete Hegseth, as well as that one Republican representative voting against the new 2025 budget reconciliation bill. I think it's far more nuanced, and despite Donald Trump's Trumpism taking most of the party's ideology, notable moderates to traditionalists still exist within these spaces; Mitt Romney and Meghan McCain are still in a somewhat notable space of influence after all. Not to mention, Democrats still vote alongside their party lines most of the time as well... just saying.
I think it's definitely more nuanced; I actually don't know how to formally make a counter-RfC yet, but I'd like your take on it Simon. DougheGojiraMan (talk) 21:18, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I was originally advocating to add far-right to factional ideologies and changed my mind on that, preferring to exclude anything other than right-wing being persuaded both by the inconsistency of the academic literature and the requirements of an infobox to summarize. And I think that's where I ultimately land. Are there differences and inconsistencies in the ideology of various factions or individuals in the Republican party? Absolutely yes. Are any of these significant enough to be due inclusion in an infobox? that I have come to doubt. Simonm223 (talk) 21:52, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Honestly, that would be the funniest thing to do: having it as "center-right to far-right" to show how the Party has so many distinct factions within it.
Can we attract other people to this discussion?
And what do you think of the Senate Republican Conference and House Republican Conference keeping their factions? Should they keep it? DougheGojiraMan (talk) 21:59, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
As the RfC for center-right is, to my knowledge, still open you might have better luck participating in the discussion above. Simonm223 (talk) Simonm223 (talk) 22:03, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This is broadly my view. The terms center/far are much more useful in countries/systems that have meaningful third (or more) parties and/or significant groups of independent/unaffiliated members. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 22:04, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Are you implying that political parties simply cant be radical or extremist if its a multi party system? What???? EarthDude (talk) 07:35, 6 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
In my view, I still think far right should be included in the infobox, but honestly, theres just been so many rfcs on the infobox ideologies and political position alone, its getting tiring. Once the center right rfc fully closes, i think we need a moratorium for two or three months for rfcs on the infobox EarthDude (talk) 07:34, 6 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think the ideology and political position section of the HRC and SRC need to match this article's ideology and position EarthDude (talk) 07:39, 6 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Source to Share, still banned from editing the article until 3/18/25

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I'm still banned from editing the article for now, and don't plan to appeal it. But I found a really good source. Based on this RS, I think it is fair to describe the Republican Party as right-wing, and exclude center-right. For comparison, the Democratic Party was found (the graphic is copyrighted) not to be an outlier on liberal/conservative values or international cooperation.

Title: Why the Maga mindset is different; US decisions can no longer be analysed using assumptions shared across the democratic west

Relevant quotes:

  • "Usually, analysis is done at national level, but by drilling down to different political parties in the latest raw data I find that on everything from attitudes towards international co-operation, to appetite for an autocratic leadership style, through to trust in institutions and inward- vs outward-looking mindset, Trump’s America is a stark outlier from western Europe and the rest of the Anglosphere. In many cases, the Maga mindset is much closer to that of Vladimir Putin’s Russia or Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s Turkey.""
  • "The stark divide remains even when we compare US Republicans with their conservative counterparts elsewhere in the west. On the key policy issues defining the 2020s, Trump-era Republicans are a different breed from the British, French or German right. This wasn’t always the case. The US Republicans of 20 years ago were no keener on autocracy than the average Canadian or western European — and just as supportive of international co-operation. Picture George W. Bush and Tony Blair “shoulder to shoulder”.
  • "A government seemingly driven by zero-sum ideology and a commitment to reducing international co-operation is one whose threats of a trade war you should probably take seriously despite possible economic self-harm. Likewise, a leadership team that believes geopolitics is a game of cards played by strong men and great powers is one whose support and co- operation other countries should quickly build independence from. The next four years and beyond will be a bumpy ride come what may, but it will be more navigable after accepting that the world has fundamentally changed. For decades, the US was the champion of western values. The America of Trump, Vance and Musk has left them behind."

Link: https://www.ft.com/content/3046013f-da85-4987-92a5-4a9e3008a9e1 JohnAdams1800 (talk) 14:05, 7 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

"the Maga mindset is much closer to that of Vladimir Putin’s Russia or Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s Turkey."" "And you needed a source for that, Captain Obvious? Trumpism and Putinism are both nationalist and imperialist ideologies. Per the main article on Putinism: "He characterized Putinism as "the highest and final stage of bandit capitalism in Russia, the stage where, as one half-forgotten classic said, the bourgeoisie throws the flag of the democratic freedoms and the human rights overboard; and also as a war, 'consolidation' of the nation on the ground of hatred against some ethnic group, attack on freedom of speech and information brainwashing, isolation from the outside world and further economic degradation"." [1][2] Dimadick (talk) 17:15, 7 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
My point was to mention the source, to help when it comes to this talk page's recurring discussions over characterizing the Republican Party as center-right, right-wing, or far-right. Fundamentally, the source lends credibility to characterizing the Republican Party as an international outlier, yet still able to win nationwide in extremely competitive elections.
The mentions of Putin and Erdogan were done by the source, not me. This is about the Republican Party's transformation broadly when it comes down to the policy positions of the party's voters and elected officials in the Trump era. This isn't solely about Putin and Trump. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 18:12, 7 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
None of your sources say the party is right-wing and none are reliable sources. TFD (talk) 19:43, 7 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@The Four Deuces This is just one source, the Financial Times (a British newspaper), and it's behind a paywall. I'm not sure why you consider this not to be a reliable source.
  • Do you want me to gift you the article on your talk page (there are limits to the numbers of viewers per article gift)? This source doesn't cover specific issues, but the party broadly. I'm not editing the Republican Party article until March 18, with no plans to appeal the short-term ban.
Fundamentally, it finds the Republican Party to broadly be a major outlier along two axes: liberal/conservative values and international cooperation. The Democratic Party is well within the mainstream by comparison.
  • The point is the Republican Party's voter and political views are now outliers compared to the Anglosphere (i.e. UK, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand) and Western Europe.
JohnAdams1800 (talk) 22:57, 7 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
See Editorial and opinion commentary: "Editorial commentary, analysis and opinion pieces, whether written by the editors of the publication (editorials) or outside authors (invited op-eds and letters to the editor from notable figures) are reliable primary sources for statements attributed to that editor or author, but are rarely reliable for statements of fact."
Why would you take the word of a journalist writing to a deadline instead of material written by professors for an academic audience? TFD (talk) 00:52, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

References

  1. ^ Piontkovsky, Andrey (11 January 2000). "Путинизм как высшая и заключительная стадия бандитского капитализма в России" [Putinism as highest and final stage of bandit capitalism in Russia]. Советская Россия [Sovetskaya Rossiya] (in Russian). No. 3. Moscow.
  2. ^ Piontkovsky, Andrey (11 January 2000). "Путинизм как высшая и заключительная стадия бандитского капитализма в России" (in Russian). Yabloko. Archived from the original on 15 May 2021. Retrieved 18 June 2021.

RfC on infobox political position footnote

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Should the infobox include the following footnote attached to the party's political position (described as right wing)?

Parts of the Republican Party have been described as center-right[1][2] or far-right.[3][4]

  1. ^ Keckler, Charles; Rozell, Mark J. (April 3, 2015). "The Libertarian Right and the Religious Right". Perspectives on Political Science. 44 (2): 92–99. doi:10.1080/10457097.2015.1011476. To better understand the structure of cooperation and competition between these groups, we construct an anatomy of the American center-right, which identifies them as incipient factions within the conservative movement and its political instrument, the Republican Party.
  2. ^ Dumain, Emma (December 10, 2015). "Tuesday Group Wins Big on Steering Committee". Roll Call. The conservative House Freedom Caucus was the first faction to start pushing leadership to expand diversity on the House Republican Steering Committee, but it was the center-right Tuesday Group that ended up winning the lion's share of the influential panel's six open seats.
  3. ^ Touchberry, Ramsey; Soellner, Mica (November 9, 2022). "Emboldened far-right Freedom Caucus presents hurdles to Kevin McCarthy's run for House speaker". The Washington Times. Retrieved November 24, 2022.
  4. ^ Rouse, Stella M.; Hunt, Charles; Essel, Kristen (March 2022). "Growing Tea With Subnational Roots: Tea Party Affiliation, Factionalism, and GOP Politics in State Legislatures". American Politics Research. 50 (2): 242–254. doi:10.1177/1532673X211041150. ISSN 1532-673X.

Will Thorpe (talk) 07:24, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Support; a clear majority of editors supported the removal of 'center-right' from the 'political position' section of the infobox but there was some opposition and there were attempts to find a middle ground option.
Numerous reliable sources including from the past few years identify reasonably-sized sections of the Republican Party as being either center-right or far-right, and as both of these categories carry important distinctions in policy and ideological terms, and represent sufficiently notable contingents of the party (refer to the congressional membership of the Tuesday Group or the Freedom Caucus), this clarification is worth inclusion in the infobox.
Footnotes are used in the infoboxes of other Wikipedia articles to clarify arguably finer details than this of a party's political orientation, including on the articles for the Democratic Party and the Liberal Party of Australia.
Both terms are widely applied enough to sufficiently relevant sections of the GOP to negate the criticism which may arise from WP:UNDUE – as does the fact this acknowledgment of the GOP's fuller ideological spectrum has been relegated to a footnote. This, I contend, ought to be an acceptable middle ground when all factors are considered, which does the best job at informing the reader at a glance of the party's political orientation/s whilst leaving further detail for the article body, and doing all of this in an appropriately balanced way reflective of reliable sources.
Cheers, Will Thorpe (talk) 07:35, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
it has been discussed and rejected many times, please see earlier discussions before opening another rfc 62.217.191.221 (talk) 09:29, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This is not the same matter. Will Thorpe (talk) 09:49, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
To clarify – there have been discussions about what the 'Political position' section should read, but at least no recent dedicated discussions about a potential footnote. Will Thorpe (talk) 09:51, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose: This would clutter the infobox too much. I generally oppose footnotes in infoboxes, but they are sometimes necessary for clarity. In this case, I oppose ur footnote because it is unnecessary and would add clutter to the infobox. EarthDude (talk) 12:00, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose: As I've opened up a topic in the space down below, the Senate Republican Conference and House Republican Conference still retain their "center-right to right-wing" labels, which is understandable as people like Mitch McConnell and Lisa Murkowski still remain active in Congress. Even Trump supporting people like John Thune are not explicitly affiliated with Trumpism, noted by how he and actually many other senators are not in the list of politicians associated with Trumpism. The only reason why the GOP in this page and the "List of political parties in the United States" page had their ideology changed was only due to one man: Donald Trump. If both chambers of the Republican legislature are still deemed as "center-right," then I think that justifies enough reason to bring back (unless of course, we change those too). This has no need for sourcing; you can just go to their wiki pages and see what their positions say, and see that not ALL of them favor Trump the way Matt Gaetz would. DougheGojiraMan (talk) 14:42, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"opened up above" I mean DougheGojiraMan (talk) 14:43, 8 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@DougheGojiraMan Do you mean to support, then? Will Thorpe (talk) 22:33, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If it means putting center-right back, yes. DougheGojiraMan (talk) 23:03, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose The info-box didn't have a position for both parties on the spectrum for many years. We should consider just removing them from both articles. I've frankly grown sick of the contentious discussions about them, particularly for the Republican Party's talk page. JohnAdams1800 (talk) 18:42, 9 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@JohnAdams1800 that may be advisable. The ‘ideology’ section does a good job as surmising where the party stands, Will Thorpe (talk) 22:35, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That would be better IMO as well. Cheers. DN (talk) 22:43, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
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