Pa. GOP split on embracing Trump
WASHINGTON — David Thornburgh recalls the Republican Party’s halcyon days as defined by his late father, Dick Thornburgh, the Pittsburgharea politician who was Pennsylvania governor for two terms during the Reagan years and U.S. attorney general under George H.W. Bush and who was remembered fondly by all sides of the political spectrum after his death Dec. 31.
In today’s political climate, Mr. Thornburgh doesn’t see much of “the party of [Teddy]
Roosevelt, and Eisenhower, and Lincoln,” he said last week in explaining his decision to leave the GOP and register as an independent. “I felt the Republican Party left me,” he said, to pursue Twitter followers and “endless flame wars with the opposition.”
Mr. Thornburgh, who leads a Philadelphia nonpartisan organization (Committee of Seventy) that advocates for more effective government, added he was optimistic “things will be different as we hear less and less about Donald Trump.”
But Mr. Trump — despite losing his social media platforms — has no plans to fade away. The former president still wields tremendous power over Republicans in Washington who are ready to seek his help in reclaiming control of Congress in 2022.
On Thursday, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., visited Mr. Trump in Florida to discuss working together in the upcoming election cycle. Mr. Trump, in a statement, said his “popularity has never been stronger than it is today, and [my] endorsement means more than perhaps any endorsement at any time.”
That alliance belies the reality among Republican voters who remain split on the former president’s legacy and role in party politics going forward, according to GOP strategists and recent polling data. Mr. Trump left office this month with an approval rating of 29%, according to Pew Research Center, the lowest the center measured during his tenure.
The divide is striking in Pennsylvania, whose Republican leaders were once known on the national stage as moderates who, like the late Mr. Thornburgh, were planted firmly in the GOP establishment. As recently as the 2000s, the Keystone State sent to Washington political centrists such as former Sen. Arlen Specter and former Gov. Tom Ridge, who became the first secretary of Homeland Security under President George W. Bush.
Now, most Pennsylvania Republicans remain loyal to Mr. Trump — to the point that they back his claims of widespread voter fraud — and even after the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by a mob who believed lawmakers were attempting to “steal” the election from Mr. Trump.
Hours after the attack, eight of the nine Republicans in Pennsylvania’s congressional delegation voted against certifying the state’s 20 electoral votes for President Joe Biden.
Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Butler, led a lawsuit to throw out the state’s 2.5 million mail-in ballots, claiming its election law was unconstitutional. Rep. Scott Perry, R-York, helped Mr. Trump concoct a plan to fire the acting attorney general in an effort to stay in office, The New York Times reported this month.
Rep. John Joyce, R-Blair, said in an interview last week that Mr. Trump should “absolutely” be a leader in the party, ticking off the former president’s policies on the economy and energy development.
And Rep. Guy Reschenthaler, R-Peters, issued an email to constituents Jan. 21 titled “Thanking President Trump For His Service” and featuring a photo of the two giving a thumbs-up together. On Jan. 6, hours before the Capitol attack, Mr. Reschenthaler tweeted that Mr. Trump “is
the BEST president since Lincoln.”
Mr. Reschenthaler, who has not responded to the Post-Gazette’s requests for an interview since the attack, told TV network Newsmax on Jan. 21 that it was the Republicans’ duty to remain loyal to the former president.
“We need Republicans to stick together,” Mr. Reschenthaler said. “The Republicans in the House, by and large, are holding the line. We’re supporting President Trump, dare I say the once and future president. We need to hold the line moreso than ever, and we need Republicans in the Senate to circle the wagons.”
Some Republicans down the ballot in Pennsylvania are less enthused about putting Mr. Trump front and center, especially ahead of crucial statewide races for Pennsylvania governor and U.S. Senate in 2022.
While Democrats appear to be clearing the way for Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro and Lt. Gov. John Fetterman to run in those respective races, the Republican field is wide open.
Those races pose a dilemma for Republicans: Should its candidates appeal to Pennsylvania’s moderate voters or Mr. Trump’s base? Is there a way to include both without alienating the other?
An electoral impact
Nationwide, both groups could make a large electoral impact.
A Morning Consult poll conducted Jan. 22-25 found 50% of Republicans nationwide believe the former president should play “a major role” in their party going forward. About 23% said he should play “no role,” and another 15% said the role should be “minor.”
The poll also found 30% of Republicans would be open to joining a third party started by Mr. Trump, while 36% would stick with the GOP in that circumstance. It indicated a great unknown, too: A quarter of respondents said they had no opinion or didn’t know what they would do. Another 8% would choose neither party.
Other polls, worded differently, showed a desire within the party to find fresh leadership.
A CNN poll conducted Jan. 9-14, found 53% of Republicans
want the party to “move on” from Mr. Trump, compared with 43% who want the party to “continue to treat Trump as its leader.”
It is no surprise that Pennsylvania Republicans in Congress have not strayed from Mr. Trump, said Kristin Kanthak, an associate professor of political science at the University of Pittsburgh. Republican-held districts are safe from Democratic challengers; any real threat would come during the primary election, which can produce extreme challengers to the incumbent, she said.
For that reason, she added, the party is seeking to fend off that kind of challenge by keeping the former president close.
“Republicans here in Western Pennsylvania have been very careful to eliminate the daylight between them and Trump, and that will protect them from a primary challenge,” Ms. Kanthak said. “There’s not much incentive for anyone to change their strategies. I expect to see more digging in.”
But Pennsylvania’s statewide results in 2020 paint a more complicated picture for those hewing to Mr. Trump.
Last year, a large number of voters split their ballots, casting votes for Republicans
in state and local races but checking Mr. Biden’s name at the top of the ticket. While Mr. Biden won the state by more than 70,000 votes, Republicans won statewide races for state auditor general and treasurer and won back a key state Senate seat in Pittsburgh’s southern suburbs.
As a warning to Republican leaders, some political strategists pointed to the failed 2018 gubernatorial campaign of Scott Wagner, the state lawmaker who styled himself in the mold of Mr. Trump and lost by 18 points to incumbent Gov. Tom Wolf.
“Scott Wagner lost so disastrously because he
couldn’t bring out the moderate voters,” Mr. Thornburgh said.
“The test of the Republican Party really will be not the general election of 2022, but it will be the primary elections, which I think is really unfortunate,” Mr. Thornburgh said. “It’s very hard to govern when you’re dealing with, in Harrisburg and Washington, the extreme wings of both parties.”
Opportunity to gain
Mike DeVanney, a GOP political strategist and a former executive director of the Republican Committee of Allegheny County, said this moment presents an opportunity for conservative values to gain traction with moderate voters.
He lamented that some Republicans have stepped down from public office or left the party altogether. Last week, Sen. Rob Portman, ROhio, announced he would not seek re-election in 2022, citing “gridlock” that pushes politicians “further and further to the right or to the left, and it’s harder to find people willing to do the hard work to find that middle ground.”
Mr. Portman followed the same decision by Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., who decried Republican lawmakers’ efforts to overturn the Jan. 6 election by claiming voter fraud and often clashed with Mr. Trump.
“We are in a position where there’s a dearth in leadership,” said Mr. DeVanney, a partner at Coldspark, a Pittsburgh-based political consulting firm that counts both Mr. Toomey and Mr. Reschenthaler among its clients.
He said he hoped Republicans would cut through the “chaos” and emerge “from the ashes” by growing the party’s ability to connect with blue-collar voters on kitchen-table issues, he said.
“We’re certainly at a tipping point, and that’s why I really think our party, rather than just focusing on personalities, really needs to be focused on policy that can help people’s lives,” he said.
“The pendulum will shift back toward Republicans, and Republicans will have one last chance to actually prove we can govern effectively,” Mr. DeVanney predicted. “We can’t just be a party of ‘no.’ ”
Sam DeMarco, chair of the Republican Committee of Allegheny County, said he will have a clearer indication of the party’s direction in the next six months or so.
“You’re going to need somebody that embraces the president’s policies, but perhaps can’t be faced with any of the negatives,” Mr. DeMarco said.
“There are folks out there that, because of their position of challenging the electors or the claims of election fraud, they may find it challenging to earn the support necessary to win a general election” in Pennsylvania.
Mr. DeMarco said he has been flooded with messages from people who send him what they believe to be evidence of voter fraud and demanding to know what he’s doing about it. He has yet to see real proof of such fraud, he said.
“I think for a lot of Republicans, it’s been difficult to this point to move on,” Mr. DeMarco said. “People have concerns, and I understand that, but you have to move forward. You can’t dwell on the past.”
No faction of the party is big enough to win on its own, he added. If Trump supporters truly want the president’s legacy to survive, “They need to support the Republican Party,” he said.