It seemed a long time coming, but she apparently took him by surprise.

“It is because of my love for our country,” said former Democrat Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard on Tuesday night at a rally in Greensboro, North Carolina, “and specifically because of the leadership that President Trump has brought to transform the Republican Party and bring it back to the party of the people and the party of peace, that I’m proud to stand here with you today, President Trump, and announce that I’m joining the Republican Party. I am joining the party of the people.”

Trump’s reaction says it all:

For independent-thinkers like myself, there is no home in the Democrat Party. However, there is a home for us in the Republican Party.

The Republican Party of warmongering elite Dick Cheney is in the past. Trump’s GOP is a big open tent party of the people, equality,… pic.twitter.com/lz19KyYERf

— Tulsi Gabbard 🌺 (@TulsiGabbard) October 23, 2024

Gabbard’s remarks began innocently enough: “You know, I was a Democrat for over 20 years. Today’s Democrat Party is completely unrecognizable, which points to the clear choice that we have in this election today.” She railed against the Party of Kamala Harris as being “anti-freedom,” “pro-censorship,” and “pro-war.” She noted that Harris has “shamelessly embraced the support of warmongers like Dick Cheney and Liz Cheney, and others who care more about power and feeding the military-industrial complex than they care about you.”

These comments were bold, and they were not insignificant to this audience. Greensboro, after all, is just 90 minutes away from Fort Bragg — or Fort Liberty, as it’s now known — which is the world’s largest military base. Of course, Gabbard is herself a citizen-soldier, having served for years in the Hawaii National Guard, having done a 12-month tour in Iraq, and having later transferred to a Reserve Army unit in California.

Or maybe Gabbard’s remarks aren’t too surprising at all, given that, as English novelist Philippa Gregory has said, “There is no one who loves peace more than a soldier.” Or, as General Douglas MacArthur put it, “The soldier above all others prays for peace, for it is the soldier who must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war.”

In any case, Gabbard thus ended her status as an independent, and Trump thus continued his efforts to remake the Republican Party, to expand its tent, and to appeal to disaffected Democrats everywhere.

As I noted back in 2020 in a piece titled “The Blue-Collar Billionaire,” the two parties have done a switcheroo. And not a fake one, like the Democrats say happened in the Civil Rights ‘60s, but a real one with real consequences:

The culture and the counterculture have switched sides, and there’s no denying it. Democrats are now the elites, the paternalists, the Chardonnay-sippers, the theater-goers, the media darlings, the foundation favorites, the advanced-degree types, and the party preferred by Wall Street. Republicans, on the other hand, have welcomed in the workers, the grinders, the hog butchers, the middle-managers, the guys and gals in the field and on the shop floor. The Republican Party is diverse, but the common thread is Patriotism. We love our country, and we don’t apologize for it.

“The party of equality,” Gabbard continued. “The party that was founded to fight against and end slavery in this country. It is the party of common sense and the party that is led by a president who has the courage and strength to fight for peace.”

“Thank you very much, Tulsi,” said a clearly surprised Donald Trump. “That’s great. Wow, that was a surprise. That was really— she’s been independent for a long time. That’s a great thing. A great honor. Thank you very much, Tulsi.”

Last night, at a Turning Point Action rally in Duluth, Georgia, Gabbard spoke once again as a Republican: “A vote for Donald Trump is a vote for every one of us as Americans to be able to stand strong and proud and recognize that in this country, we are once again that shining city on a hill that is committed to our Constitution and our way of life.”

That “shining city” remark was appropriate, having been noted by Ronald Reagan in his farewell address in 1989. Reagan, too, was once a disaffected Democrat, a man who said, “I didn’t leave the Democratic Party; the Democratic Party left me.”

Of course, Reagan also said, upon leaving the Democrats and joining the Republicans: “I know what it’s like to pull the Republican lever for the first time — I used to be a Democrat myself. And I can tell you, it only hurts for a minute, and then it feels great.”

With Tulsi Gabbard, though, we get the sense that it didn’t hurt at all. Not even for a minute.