Return of the moderate Republican
Excesses of Trump era prompt some to question if GOP is poised for a comeback in Connecticut
Connecticut was once the domain of old-money, Yankee Republicans such as Prescott Bush, a former U.S. senator and patriarch of a political dynasty, and Chris Shays, an independent-minded former congressman who represented Fairfield County.
But the breed has largely faded from view in recent years, as first the Tea Party, then Donald Trump and his supporters pushed the moderates out.
Liz Cheney, a Republican congresswoman from Wyoming, has been vilified by Trump and his supporters after she repudiated his lie that the 2020 election was stolen. GOP leaders in Congress are attempting to remove Cheney from her leadership role as House Republican conference chair. One of her prominent defenders has been Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, the former Republican governor of Massachusetts.
Despite the ideological infighting in Washington, some in Connecticut are asking if the New England Republican is poised for a comeback following the excesses of the Trump era.
Larry Lazor certainly hopes so. The OB/GYN from West Hartford announced his run for Congress in Connecticut’s 1st District on Wednesday by declaring his independence from Trumpism.
“The Republican Party is in a fight for its soul,” Lazor said in his campaign kickoff video. “Let me say clearly that the presidential election in 2020 was fair and the storming of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 was a blow to our democracy. Leaders who say otherwise damage our country.”
Lazor isn’t the only Republican in recent weeks to denounce Trump’s false assertion that the election was fraudulent. Glastonbury Town Council member
Stewart “Chip” Beckett stepped down from his minority leadership role after quitting the Republican party, which he said no longer represents American laws and values at the national level.
“I do think there is a lane for moderate Republicans in Connecticut,” said Gary Rose, the chairman of the government department at Sacred Heart University. “There was a time when we had three of them in Congress all at once. I know the party has gotten smaller and a little more Trumpish, but I don’t believe Trump is defining the nature of Republicanism in Connecticut.”
Moderate Republicans — from Leverett Saltonstall and Henry Cabot Lodge to John Chafee and Lowell P. Weicker Jr. to Nancy Johnson and Rob Simmons — once helped define New England.
They are now on the brink of extinction in the U.S. Congress: Maine Sen. Susan Collins is the only Republican representing the region in Washington. Republicans have fared better in state capitols: Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont are all led by members of the GOP.
Simmons, who represented Connecticut’s 2nd District in Congress from 2001 to 2007, said moderates face a challenge getting by the insiders at the party’s nominating convention because delegates and activists tend to be more conservative than rank-and-file Republican voters.
“That’s the key hurdle for these moderate Republicans in Connecticut,” Simmons said.
He recalled his own experience running for U.S. Senate in 2010. “I ran as Rob Simmons, fiscally conservative and socially moderate, but the party had shifted and Linda McMahon came in and bought the convention,” he said.
Simmons has long been a supporter of legalized abortion, “but at the convention, McMahon and her goons pictured me as so pro-abortion you’d think I was walking around with a surgeon’s knife in my back pocket. That’s how the right-wingers destroy the good candidates.”
Although he has been open about the fact that he voted for Trump twice, Simmons says he’s “not a Trumper.” He already donated $50 to Lazor’s campaign.
“I would not give a dime to somebody who wasn’t a moderate like me — because it’s a waste of money’“Simmons said. “If you’re a hardcore social conservative, that’s not who the bulk of the people are in Connecticut so you’re not going to win here. You need to move to Florida or Texas or Arizona and that’s great, you can go down there and you can win there.”
He added: “If you run as a Trumper, you can’t win in Connecticut. Republicans seem to have lost sight of that.”
Republican leaders say the party is a big tent that can accommodate various ideological views.
“I believe we need to embrace those that have different opinions and learn from each other and recognize that we as Republicans can agree on many things, such as reducing taxes and making our state and nation more affordable,” said Sue Hatfield, chairwoman of the Connecticut Republican Party.
Trump has long enjoyed significant support among state Republicans: He won the GOP primary in 2016, handily defeating former Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a more moderate candidate in both temperament and ideology.
The former president continues to cast a shadow over the state Republican Party, even though he left office in January and has been barred from several social media platforms, said Ron Schurin, a professor of political science at UConn.
Schurin said he is encouraged that a Republican such as Lazor has stepped forward. “Those of us who believe in the two-party system look at this kind of candidacy as a ray of hope,” Schurin said. “It’s good to see a fiscally conservative, socially moderate democracy-supporting Republican enter the race.”
The party, Schurin added, “has been taken over by a group of people who seem to be in desperate fear of Donald Trump, and you only have to look at what’s happening to Liz Cheney to see that.”
Shays represented Connecticut’s 4th District from 1987 to 2009 and proudly wore the moderate label. He has become a staunch “never Trumper,” and voted for Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, although he remains a Republican.
“It’s been shameful that any patriotic American would be telling people the election was stolen and that ... Biden hadn’t won,” Shays said. “For Republicans to have allowed themselves to spread such an outrageous lie is inexcusable.”
Apart from Trump’s lies about the 2020 election, Shays faults both major parties for veering too far into their ideological corners. “Both have become more faithful to their tribe, their party . ... They’re not putting the country first,” he said.