GOP STUCK WITH A TRUMP BALL AND CHAIN
When Sen. John Thune, R-South Dakota, agreed to appear on “Fox News Sunday” this week, he no doubt expected to discuss issues such as infrastructure, immigration and gun control. What he did not expect, surely, was having to react to his party’s most recent president calling the GOP’s most senior lawmaker a “dumb son of a b——.” But that’s the position the Senate minority whip and a number of other Republican guests on the Sunday shows found themselves in, after former president Donald Trump bashed Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, in a speech to Republican donors Saturday night. And it’s a reminder that, even as Trump has mostly gone quiet since his ignominious exit in January, the Republican Party can’t get rid of him.
Thune and other Republicans did their best to avoid pouring gasoline onto the fire. “I think a lot of that rhetoric is — you know, it’s part of the style and tone that comes with the former president,” Thune said noncommittally. “It’s not a big deal,” said Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a Republican, on CNN’s “State of the Union, “… but, at the same time, whenever it draws attention, we don’t need that. We need unity.”
On CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyoming, was slightly more critical of Trump’s other intraparty criticism, attacking former vice president Mike Pence for certifying the Electoral College results in January. “The former president is using the same language that he knows provoked violence on January 6th,” she said. But the House Republican conference chair was quick to pivot: “We need to be focused on the future… . And for us as a party going forward, we have to embrace the Constitution and we also have to put forward positive solutions.”
Even when Trump’s Saturday address wasn’t the topic, the former president was still tripping up Republicans. Back on “Fox News Sunday,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, was ready to blast the Biden administration over cases of child sexual abuse at a migrant shelter in San Antonio. There was just one problem: As host Chris Wallace pointed out, “There were thousands of complaints of sexual abuse at migrant shelters during the Trump years … but we couldn’t find one instance of you complaining and calling that out when President Trump was president.”
Indeed, if Trump were a normal ex-president, Thune and others could have all but ignored the questions.
But Trump is different, for a few reasons. First, most also-rans in a presidential election — incumbent or not — lose their national stature after Election Day faster than a new car loses its value when you drive it off the lot. Polls suggest that Trump, by contrast, could easily be the first presidential loser later renominated by a major party since Richard Nixon 50 years ago.
Even if Trump doesn’t run in 2024, though, Republicans can’t get rid of him for two other reasons. First, as my Washington Post colleague Greg Sargent pointed out, one of the party’s biggest causes at the moment — voting restrictions — is inextricably tied to the former president’s lies about the 2020 election. The nationwide campaign to limit voting rights all stems from lawmakers’ acceptance (sometimes tacit, sometimes not) of Trump and his allies’ campaign to undermine the results.
Second, Trump has the money. GOP small donors remain big fans of the president, with The New York Times reporting that Trump has more cash on hand than the Republican National Committee.
Historically, when one party takes over the White House and Congress, the minority party does well in the following midterm elections. But as Sunday showed, this cycle the minority party has a ball and chain on its ankle, in the form of Trump. With a drag that big, don’t be surprised if the GOP snatches defeat from the jaws of victory.