Who exactly is a MAGA Republican?

One can recognise such Republicans by their MAGA apparel.

It’s a left wing buzzword for Trump supporters in my mind. They do seem to self advertise with Trump bumper stickers and whatnot. They tend to be fringy like you describe. Most normal Republicans have moved on.

Of course Republicans use it too. Or rather, as time goes by, SOME Republicans. It originated as Trump’s campaign slogan, and subsequent events have rendered it suitable for all the derision and ridicule worthy of the pig responsible along with his remaining witless acolytes. And it is not merely a leftwing buzzword. It is now a societally understood acronym interpreted mainstream as short for bungling obstinate stupidity. Most Republicans might well prefer to move on, but the red hats proliferate incessantly to the perpetual embarrssment of both the party and country at large. Perhaps we are blessed that these poor souls so readily self identify with “I am hopelessly gullible” slapped atop their empty heads. The Democrats, as an act of charity, should offer these folks kinder substitute hats displaying a milder yet appropriate sentiment. How about “Barnum was right”?

Trump lovers who wear MAGA clothes and feel that Trump can do no wrong, the vaccine has magnets in it, the virus is fake, mainstream media is fake news, the last Presidential election was stolen by the Democrats, January 6th was no worse than the Black Lives Matters demonstrations, the migrants are being put in luxury hotels in NYC, Build the Wall! Democrats are willing to execute live, perfectly healthy babies and call it “post birth abortion.”

Oh, and I forgot: when the Republicans win elections, the election system was working fine. When Republicans lose elections, there is funny business going on and they need to “Stop the Steal.”

” A lot of Republicans who voted for Trump, who identified with the slogan Make America Great Again, aren’t necessarily Jan 6 supporting, QAnon, anti-vax lunatics, so I’m just curious how “MAGA Republicans” is being used and what it means to you”.

You should specify your time frame. In 2016, your above statement might have applied, in 2020, not so much. Nowadays, people who actively identify as MAGA Republicans tend to espouse all of those ideas, as well as white supremacy, misogyny, and fascism.

A trump maga republican is what kids in the future will be killing in video games instead of nazis.

Again, those of conservative sentiment might prefer that a period be specified for MAGA as a perjorative. That is rather equivalent to those sentiments declaring Confederate goals “The noble cause”. Regardless of any current position ascribed the conservative mainline, the Republican Party EXCULSIVELY wears the glaring stain of batshit knucklehead loudmouthed megaheads who clearly are not going away. As surely as predicted, Trump is doing to the Republican party exactly what Putin has to Ukraine. If he can’t take it over, he can and will efectively destroy it.

As far as I know, it is synonymous with “Trump supporter”. “Trump supporter” has all kinds of connotations, but in the end it simply means one who supports Trump. Trump’s “movement” is called “MAGA”, so a MAGA Republican is one who supports Trump and “Trumpism” (whatever that may be). Whether it also implies a Q-pilled MTG-supporting Jewish-laser/children-shitting-in-litterboxes-believing fruit loop, that’s on a case-by-case basis I guess. These terms are not meant to be nuanced.

To me, a MAGA Republican has always been someone who heard “Make America Great Again” and thought that “great” would mean things Republicans would support and provide, and that Trump would be a good President and would bring some sort of “greatness” to America. And, where what they tend to have in mind tends to include things like WASP culture, Fundamental Christian dogma, Puritanical tendencies, abolishing welfare programs and environmental protections, cowboy diplomacy, patriarchy and not having to hear complaints from women, no LGTBQ tolerance, abundant high-paying jobs for white people, non-white people and homeless and unemployed people going away or “staying in their place”, brutal police stomping out “crime”, unchecked capitalism and infinitely-increasing corporate profits, climate change denial, lots of military spending, machismo, solving school shootings by arming teachers, etc.

Oh, and yes, as @Demosthenes wrote, the kind of people who would hear “Make America Great Again” and think it needs no further explanation. And anyone who thinks it does need more explanation, might be someone who should leave or shut up.

Well, MAGA is specifically Trump’s slogan, so I associate the term as a pro-Trump Republican. It’s a distinction that is necessary because there are actually quite alot of Republicans who dislike Trump every bit as much as Democrats and independents. This is why Trump and his endorsed candidates consistently UNDERPEFORM relative to non-MAGA Republicans.

MAGA doesn’t necessarily imply QAnon or anti-vax or Jan 6 support…though let’s be honest, the sets have alot of overlap. I know a full bore Republican who is all four of those labels. I know another who is two of them, but very not the other two. And I know others who are Republicans but are none of those four labels.

I think the positional description of a Trump Republican/MAGA Republican is someone who is a cultural conservative first and foremost who embraces an anti-establishment and anti-immigration platform. Note that most MAGAs will deny being anti-immigration in general and will be quick to correct that they are anti-ILLEGAL immigration. And for SOME they may well be describing their feelings…but if we judge by the actions of Trump and other MAGA elected officials, it isn’t true. Trump worked just as hard to curtail legal immigration as illegal, and that has been the precedent from this wing of the GOP.

The few MAGA people I actually have somewhat known have been like:

1) MAGA, seems to believe (?) in a conspiracy of powerful people like the UK royals being Lizards from outer space, posts ignorant crap about historical Democrats from 1860s being pro-slavery, etc.

2) MAGA & QAnon maniac/troll, says they believe in and are constantly arguing about things like Jewish space lasers having set fires in California, Trump trying to let us know we already have an anti-space-alien space fleet hiding behind the moon, etc.

3) Pretended to be apolitical, ran servers for two online communities, which suddenly vanished – with a little research, it was discovered that he had been an extreme MAGA troll on Twitter . . . and his real name, which led to a court case where he’d been convicted of offering money to try to contract the killing of some doctor who provided abortion services.

@Zaku Wow.

They are the ones who still believe Trump is their legal President.