To understand the partisanship and bitterness of American politics today, you have to consider what happened in 1994. Steve Kornacki, National Political Correspondent for NBC News and MSNBC, steps back from the Big Board to tell the origin story of the 1994 Republican “revolution,” the midterm election when the GOP took the House majority for the first time in four decades. It was set in motion by Georgia Congressman Newt Gingrich, who — over the course of 15 years — pushed Republicans in a direction of confrontation and conservatism. Steve talks with Newt’s allies and adversaries about backroom strategy sessions and dramatic battles on the House floor. As yet another midterm threatens to upend the political landscape, Kornacki hears echoes of 1994 everywhere. Follow now and join Steve Kornacki through all six episodes, out October 31st

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Newt Gingrich’s political rise was anything but certain — a northerner in a Southern state, a historian prone to grandiose commentary. It takes him three tries to win a seat in the House of Representatives. But even as a freshman in 1979, his aim was clear: Defeat the Permanent Democratic Majority. Steve traces Newt’s origins and shows how the freshman congressman launches his first battle, with an attack on what Gingrich sees as corruption in Congress.

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In the early 1980s, Newt Gingrich starts recruiting Republican congressmen to his cause. They form the Conservative Opportunity Society and take advantage of a new cable channel, C-Span, which lets them circumvent the traditional media to spread their message to voters. And they confront Democrats with a fervor that old-school Republicans find distasteful. But when — in 1984 and 1985 — Newt and his followers inspire two angry showdowns in the House, their more staid colleagues start to see value in this new, confrontational style.

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