Julian Zelizer and Thomas Patterson on the Modern History of the GOP

Princeton University history professor Julian Zelizer and Harvard University government professor Thomas Patterson relive the most significant moments over the past few decades that led to the transformation of the Republican party into its current cynical and corrupt incarnation.

Much of the blame for the sad state of affairs the United States is facing gets heaped at the feet of Donald J. Trump. But while a fair amount of guilt should be borne by his contemporary enablers, there has also been a clear path over the last 50 years that has led the Republican party towards the existential darkness the president is now dragging them into. Bradlee Professor of Government & the Press at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government Thomas Patterson and Julian Zelizer, the Malcolm Stevenson Forbes Class of 1941 Professor of History and Public Affairs at Princeton School of Public & International Affairs, pinpoint the key players in this grand decline, including Nixon, Cohn, Reagan and Gingrich.