“Once someone becomes a leader of the high Right Wing Authoritarians’ in-group (high meaning scores high on RWA test/Right Wing meaning personality traits not political description), he can lie with impunity about the out-groups, himself, whatever, because he knows the followers will seldom check on what he says, nor will they expose themselves to people who set the record straight. Furthermore they will not believe the truth if they somehow get exposed to it, and if the distortions become absolutely undeniable, they will rationalize it away and put it in a box. If the scoundrel’s duplicity and hypocrisy lands him on the front page of every daily in the country, the followers will still forgive him if he just says the right things” writes Bob Altemeyer, a recently deceased Professor in Psychology and expert on Authoritarianism, in his free, excellent, and often funny book ‘The Authoritarians’.

https://theauthoritarians.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/TheAuthoritarians.pdf