I don’t know if there’s something in the water, but suddenly, we have a whole crop of Republicans showing some backbone, standing up and fighting back against the relentless unfair attacks from the left. And man, is it refreshing! A few cases in point.

Arizona Gubernatorial Candidate Kari Lake

Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake was asked to respond to a threat that the NFL would pull the Super Bowl out of Arizona if she won. Her response to arrogant billionaire team owners who think they can dictate the politics of states that build them stadiums and let them make millions there was the equivalent of intercepting their ball and spiking it in their faces.

Lake said she works for the people of Arizona, she doesn’t take marching orders from the NFL:

Do you want to tell me that a bunch of football teams owned by billionaires are okay with fentanyl pouring across our border at a record level, killing our young people? The number one killer right now is fentanyl. 18 to 45. It’s killing a generation of people. If the NFL is okay with that, then they gotta do some soul-searching. I don’t think the NFL is that stupid. I really don’t.

If the NFL wants to play chicken over the 2023 Super Bowl, I can promise you that I win that game.

The horrified leftists at MSNBC said her answer should give Arizonans “nightmares,” which is the surest sign yet that they should definitely elect her.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis

Monday night, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and challenger Charlie Crist had their first and only debate, and it was such a beatdown by DeSantis that if it had been a boxing match the referee would’ve stopped it in the second round. Here’s a write-up by Bonchie at RedState.com.

DeSantis also told a powerful story about his opposition to abortion, which is recounted here.

I hope you’ll read it all. But I’ll just quote one line to give you a taste. Crist repeatedly tried to suggest that DeSantis would quit to run for President. DeSantis replied, “I know Charlie wants to talk about 2024 and Joe Biden, but let me be clear: the only worn-out old donkey I want to put out to pasture is Charlie Crist.” Yow, that’s gonna leave a scar!

Texas Senator Ted Cruz

Sen. Ted Cruz went on “The View,” and even Whoopi Goldberg ordered a foul-mouthed leftist (are there any other kind?) in the audience to shut up and let him talk. And he did, creating one of the most entertaining episodes of “The View” in years, not that that’s saying much.

Cruz schooled the ladies on what a “trainwreck” the Biden economy is for working Americans they never meet, how much better things were under Trump, and how it’s “fundamentally wrong” for Biden’s DOJ to be treating parents as “domestic terrorists.” He called out their hypocrisy on “election deniers” by listing some of the prominent Democrats, from Hillary to Stacey Abrams, who refuse to accept their election losses. Also for fixating on the January 6th riot while ignoring months of far more destructive and violent riots by leftists like Antifa and BLM.

By the time Cruz was done, Whoopi was feigning ignorance of his points (“I don’t know what an Antifa riot is”) and Ana Navarro was reduced to asking him to lower his voice, since making Republicans shut up is the only effective response the left has to their arguments.

Rank-and-File Republicans

Even rank-and-file Republicans are sick of being quiet and taking it. An MSNBC reporter interviewed a group of Pittsburgh-area Trump supporters about January 6th, and instead of being intimidated by her condescending questions, they kept repeatedly correcting her misstatements of fact, proving that they knew more about the subject than she did.

I don’t know about you, but I’m liking this new breed of Republicans who don’t roll over and play dead, even though that’s what makes both the Democrats and the establishment Republicans in DC so terrified of them.

Mike Huckabee is the former governor of Arkansas and longtime conservative commentator on issues in culture and current events. A New York Times best-selling author, he hosts the weekly talk show Huckabee on TBN.

Originally published at MikeHuckabee.com. Reprinted with permission.