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former President Donald Trump, 
Judy# 
Woodruff explores what another 
Trump##

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nomination and presidency could 
mean for# 
the Republican Party and for 
the country.

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It's part of her series America 
at a Crossroads.

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JUDY WOODRUFF: It's not even 
February,# 
and former President Trump 
appears##

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to be on his way to sewing up 
his third GOP# 
nomination to the highest 
office in th

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DONALD TRUMP, Former President 
of# 
the United States (R) and 
Current##

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JUDY WOODRUFF: After wins#

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polls show him leading in# 
South Carolina and beyond.

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Elected Republican leaders are 
scrambling# 
to climb on board. Texas 
Senator John Cornyn##

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joined over half the GOP 
members of the# 
Senate and most of those in the 
House.

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REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA): I 
have# 
endorsed him wholeheartedly.

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SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): I 
think he's

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SEN. TIM SCOTT (R-SC): We need 
Donald Trump!

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JUDY WOODRUFF: But not all 
those in Republican# 
and conservative circles are 
joining

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including "Atlantic" magazine 
writer David Frum,##

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former speechwriter for 
President George# 
W. Bush and a longtime Trump 
critic.

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DAVID FRUM, Senior Editor, "The 
Atlantic":# 
Trump has -- he's got some 
skills,##

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and one of his skills is 
understanding# 
where the pain points are in 
people,##

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that -- the things that make 
him upset,# 
both his friends and his 
enemies. How do##

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you make your enemies upset? 
Because it's# 
often a great asset or a 
reso

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politician like him to have 
upset opponents,# 
to make the opponents crazy 
with rage too.

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JUDY WOODRUFF: How does he fit 
into the tradition# 
of conservative thought in the 
United States?

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DAVID FRUM: If conservatism 
means protecting# 
things that are precious in 
America,##

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being mindful of the hazards 
of# 
change, setting limits on 
power,##

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setting limits on appetite, 
well,# 
Donald Trump isn't any of those 
things.

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Donald Trump is exactly the 
person and exactly# 
the thing that conservativ

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sought to exclude from power. 
The whole# 
point of conservative politics 
has been##

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that you want to have power 
distributed, you# 
want to have power 
decentralized, you want to##

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make sure that the people who 
come to power are# 
people who both understand the 
constitutional##

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restraints on power, but also 
have the personal,# 
the character restraints on 
their own appetites.

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The anger and rage, the desire 
to target,# 
the willingness to use methods 
that are##

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anti-constitutional, the 
fascination with# 
violence, these are 
characteristics of##

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a different kind of politics 
than the kinds of# 
politics in the past we have 
called conservative.

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JUDY WOODRUFF: How do you 
explain the# 
loyalty that Donald Trump has 
today?

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DAVID FRUM: Well, we have seen 
that kind of# 
loyalty before in state-level 
politicians,##

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Mayor Curley in Boston, who 
somehow# 
got the support of a certain 
segment##

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of Irish Catholic Boston, Huey 
Long in Louisiana.

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What these kinds of leaders do 
is they associate# 
their hurts and grievances with 
other people's##

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hurts and grievances, and they 
use hurts# 
and grievances as permission to 
break rules,##

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and because they have convinced 
people# 
that the people who are 
enforcing the##

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rules are your cultural 
enemies.# 
And even if I did break the 
rule,##

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the fact is, you're still -- 
I'm# 
on your side and they're not.

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I don't think we have ever seen 
this before with a# 
federal -- succe

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I want to speak to hurts and 
grievances across# 
the whole culture, across the 
whole country,##

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and everyone who tries to 
enforce# 
rules on me is an enemy of 
yours.

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JUDY WOODRUFF: For someone who 
has been# 
at the center of conservative 
thought,##

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of watching conservatives, 
watching the Republican# 
Party progress over time, 
tackle tough issues,##

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do you feel that you should 
have seen# 
something like Donald Trump 
coming along?

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DAVID FRUM: I did my grieving 
for# 
my Republican Party in 2010, 
'11,##

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and '12. So I'm now deep into 
my widowhood.# 
I can think about this pretty

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I 
went to Tea Party rallies and 
I said,# 
not only do I not recognize 
this. Actually,##

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on second thought, I do 
recognize this and# 
it's everything I'm against. So 
that was##

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hard. But when Trump came 
along, look, I was# 
shocked because he was so 
personally wicked.

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But I was not shocked in# 
that this was a completely##

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different thing from what I'd 
been seeing before.

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JUDY WOODRUFF: There's an 
animosity, a# 
personal nat

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people feel now about politics. 
What is the# 
effect that Donald Trump is 
having on that?

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And if he were reelected,# 
what effect would it have?

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DAVID FRUM: Well, I wonder 
whether there's really##

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more division in the country 
today# 
than at other

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Remember the feeling about 
Vietnam and the draft.# 
I bet families had a tumult 
sittin

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dinner in 1969, '70, and '71. 
Debates over civil# 
rights and the integration of 
schools in the early##

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1950s and early 1960s, I bet 
there are families# 
that had difficulty reconciling 
about that.

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But back then, the political 
system# 
saw its job as managing. 
Leaders knew,##

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this is an incredibly diverse 
country,# 
rural versus urban, race upon 
race,##

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ethnicity upon ethnicity, 
religion upon# 
religion, sometimes men against 
women,##

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young against old, rich against 
poor,# 
all of these potential fault 
lines.

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And it's the job of the people 
who meet in the# 
buildings down the road here to 
manage t

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to say, we keep -- while 
everyone else is getting# 
excited, we keep our cool. And 
we remember th

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what is really important are 
dams and roads and# 
high schools and defense 
plants. And we're going##

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to make the deals based on 
that. And we're all# 
just going to lower the 
temperature at the center.

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But the political circle at the 
top no longer# 
sees these conflicts as dangers 
to manage.##

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They see them as resources to 
exploit. And Donald# 
Trump is better at this than 
just about anybody,##

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that they take this dangerous 
stuff,# 
and they say that is going to 
be not##

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something I'm going to try to 
contain,# 
but something I will use for 
fuel.

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JUDY WOODRUFF: What effect 
does# 
that have on today's divisions?

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DAVID FRUM: We will be more 
fractious,# 
we will be more argumentative, 
because##

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all the demons that exist in 
any society will# 
not only be liberated by t

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but will be encouraged, because 
Donald# 
Trump will be looking to his 
constituency##

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of very upset people in order 
to impose his# 
lawless will upon the 
constitutional system.

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I want to get away with 
Watergate. I want to# 
pardon myself. I want to fire 
prosecutors. I##

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want to do all the things that 
Nixon# 
did and many of the things that 
Nixon##

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never dared to do. And I'm 
telling you in# 
advance I'm

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followers to frighten the 
political# 
system into letting me have my 
way.

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JUDY WOODRUFF: And if Trump 
does use# 
the criminal justice system to 
shut down#

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investigations into his own 
conduct, including# 
alleged efforts to overturn the 
2020 election,##

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the consequences will be dire, 
according to Frum.

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DAVID FRUM: The country will be 
in the# 
streets. Congress will be in an

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We 
will talk about nothing 
else. There# 
will be no other policy.

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no other topic. You won't be 
able to# 
accomplish anything. There will 
be##

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resignations from the 
Department of Justice.# 
There may be resignati

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It is going to be chaos, and# 
the chaos will never stop.

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JUDY WOODRUFF: And if, 
conversely,# 
Joe Biden wins reelection,##

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what happens to the current 
state of# 
our country, of our polarized 
state?

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DAVID FRUM: Sigmund Freud, the 
founder of# 
psychiatry, is supposed to have 
said that the##

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purpose of psychiatry is to 
convert hysterical# 
obsessive neurosis into 
ordinary unhappine

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If Joe Biden wins, we get all 
our# 
usual problems back, rich 
versus poor,##

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urban versus rural, climate 
change,# 
deficits, structure of world 
peace,##

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trade with China. Not a single 
problem# 
will be fixed, but we will have 
a working##

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set of institutions with which 
to address the# 
problems. And our disagreements 
won't go away.

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You will just have 
non-sociopathic,# 
non-psychopathic people saying, 
OK, the people##

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outside this room disagree a 
lot. We are going# 
to sit down at the table and 
find something we##

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can agree on, so that I can 
take something to my# 
people and you can take 
something to your people.

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JUDY WOODRUFF: No guarantee, 
however, that the# 
divisions among the American 
people would ease up.

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For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm# 
Judy Woodruff in Washington.