Republicans started lying in the 90s to stay in power. Trump was a consequence of that. But yeah, pre-Trump they did "only" bend the rules to stay in power, with Trump that changed to openly trying to overthrow democracy. That you can only do by constantly lying.

Kinda sucks if you only have to parties, and one becomes a fascist cult. Makes discussing politics impossible, probably. There's just a difference between untruths, over-reactions, "cancel culture" and all those things on the one side vs. plain fascism on the other side.