This fake news is pretty crazy but I can see why conservative media including social media is focusing on constructing a narrative that
- Republicans were being framed;
- It was "The Left" doing it.
It's rather tiring to keep explaining to people who just want to engage in continuing right-wing propaganda rather than listening to Reason, but I'll try one more time. The Lincoln Project engaged in a stunt to get people to mentally associate the Republican candidate with the Unite the Right Rally and that's because in their minds the candidate is in fact mentally associated with those persons, not having disavowed them or Trump's both sides argument. Nobody was being framed since it was obvious that these were demonstrators showing this association, not actual members of Unite the Right. Of course one or two of the demonstrators might be Democrats, but that has no bearing on anything since no one was trying to frame Republicans.
The Lincoln Project is not The Left--they are anti-Trump conservatives. One could try to call them centrists or moderates, but their ideology is actually conservatism. What's more--the Lincoln Project clarified their stunt
THE SAME DAY that it happened, i.e. the same day that conservative news and social media tried to out a conspiracy of "Democrat operatives," framing Republicans.
What should be very telling about this story is all the outrage and faux fingerpointing while IGNORING the actual issue that the Republican candidate refused to disavow the both sides argument. Pro-Trump Republicans, conservatives, conservolibertarians, and other assorted Qarens cannot by nature deal with the actual issue because the actual issue is that a large contingent of their party is racist. Confederate flag waving, screaming about BLM, the Jews Will Not Replace Us racists. It was the whole Southern Strategy to get votes and Trump doubled down on it.
So, why does this faux narrative have legs? It's because right now there is an election. That's the bottom line.