Watching history unfold in Washington DC from her home in London, Jan Halper-Hayes admitted to being slightly incredulous about the images of Donald Trump supporters storming the US Capitol.
“It was kind of in some ways unbelievable,” says the long-term activist in the Republican party and former vice-president of its UK branch. She claims she has received “good information” to indicate that “Antifa people” were present at the riot.
The unsubstantiated claim that Antifa – a catch-all term used by the president and others to describe anti-Trump protest movements – had infiltrated the mob is one that some of his most die-hard supporters have clung to.
That the idea has made the leap across the Atlantic underlines how the Republican diaspora have not been immune to some of the bitter controversies splitting the party in its homeland.
In the UK, the Trump presidency has taken something of a toll on the local branch of Republicans Overseas, which largely operates as a social circle for expatriate supporters who organise a 4th July party each year and carry out voter registration.
Some members, and particularly young women, previously involved with the group have stepped away since the president’s 2016 election and, in some cases, even voted for Joe Biden.
Halper-Hayes, a former member of Trump’s White House transition team and visitor to his Mar-a-Lago resort, remains loyal nevertheless, insisting that it has never been hard to square support for Trump with traditional Republican values.
“I knew him when I lived in New York, so I have known him through all his iterations. I was on his transition team, and from encounters and observations I can tell you that he is so friendly and funny. It’s a shame that he used Twitter for a nasty side because that’s not who he really is.
“Whether I am in an Uber car or in a supermarket, people love Trump here in the UK. It’s the BBC and the Guardian that take on a different mainstream media narrative.”
Molly Kiniry has a very different take on Trump. She watched his rise both within the party and in national US politics with what she says was “increasing amounts of horror”. She views his most recent conduct as “a manifestation of the mental instability that has been there all along”.
Not that being a Republican supporter in an often left-leaning city like London was ever without complexities. “What I normally say when people express surprise that I’m a Republican is something to the effect of ‘I am, I just hide the horns very well’.”
Casting her US presidential vote for Joe Biden this time came easily, says Kiniry, a former spokesperson for Republicans Overseas UK and now a graduate student at Cambridge who acknowledges that the president and his loyalists would likely regard her as a Rino [Republican in name only].
Like others, she says she is looking forward to her party regaining its traditional identity. She remains optimistic. “I don’t think I would still be a registered Republican after the last five or six years if that was not the case.”
She is withering about those who have stood by the president in the US seat of power and, as a native Washingtonian, admits that the destructive events in DC had cut deep. “I think the members who did not vote to impeach the president will have to answer to voters, and to history as well, quite frankly.”
A third view of sorts is espoused by Greg Swenson, a spokesperson for Republicans Overseas, who insists that Trump managed to win over him and others who had originally wanted someone else to be the party’s 2016 candidate. It was notable today that the majority of the UK branch’s board were women, he says. “I criticised him, but I can say that I have been very happy with what he did.”
As an investment banker, he was attracted in particular to Trump’s stewardship of the US economy. “I became more of a supporter as we saw the results, for example, of tax deregulation, but it was also the massive pushback against him from Democrats and the left. As they became more unhinged, the more dug in Trump supporters have become.”
That said, Swenson confesses that he is relishing a spell “in opposition” after four years defending a president who, he concedes, “finally overdid it”. He adds: “Trump fatigue is exhausting for every one, whether they are supporters or opponents – so I’m kind of looking forward to it.”
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