some here just refuse to admit they fucked up....others willing to overlook everything in the name of personal greed....others just the usual brainwashed and mindfucked republicans.....don't have a lick of sense just support the party....while the party as usual is destroying the country from within....and they are supporting it
Wake Up, America! Wake Up! PLEASE!!
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some here just refuse to admit they fucked up....others willing to overlook everything in the name of personal greed....others just the usual brainwashed and mindfucked republicans.....don't have a lick of sense just support the party....while the party as usual is destroying the country from within....and they are supporting it
This is how Trump is destroying the Republican Party - WHYY
how-trump-is-destroying-the-republican-party
Apr 19, 2018 · Donald Trump has remade the Republican Party in his own image. Under his mismanagement and ineptitude, the GOP has become the party of corruption and plunder, kakistocracy, and white nationalism. Trump is dismantling the government and his party with it.
How Trump Is Destroying the Republican Party ...
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/2018/01/24/how_trump_is_destroying_the_republican...
Jan 24, 2018 · Under Donald Trump, the GOP no longer cares about the federal debt, states' rights or Russian aggression, says Robert Reich. Related Articles. How Trump Is Destroying the Republican Party. Under Donald Trump, the GOP no longer cares about the federal debt, states' rights or Russian aggression, says Robert Reich.
The Republican Party, Not Trump, Is the Real Threat to American Democracy
On Thursday morning, President Donald Trump called into Fox & Friends and went on such a rant that even the show’s conservative hosts seemed startled. “You look at the corruption at the top of the FBI, it’s a disgrace,” he said. “And our Justice Department—which I try and stay away from, but at some point I won’t—our Justice Department should be looking at that kind of stuff, not the nonsense of collusion with Russia.” As if to protect Trump from further embarrassment, Brian Kilmeade cut the interview short by saying, “We’d talk to you all day but it looks like you have a million things to do.”
This is what Trump’s critics have warned about all along: that he’s an authoritarian who would use the office of the presidency to destroy norms (like his attempts, as in the Fox interview, to undermine the independence of the Department of Justice). And in destroying those norms, some fear, Trump could destroy American democracy itself—or at least contribute to its decline. “Donald Trump is not the heart attack of democracy, he is the gum disease of democracy,” The Atlantic’s David Frum said during a Brookings Institution forum in February. “You can die from gum disease, but it festers for a long time before it finishes you off.”
But some Trump critics lately have argued that he’s not the disease at all. “The problems we face run deeper than the Trump presidency,” Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, the Harvard political scientists and authors of the recent book How Democracies Die, wrote in The New York Times in January. “While Mr. Trump’s autocratic impulses have fueled our political system’s mounting crisis, he is as much a symptom as he is a cause of this crisis.” The crisis, as they see it, is that “the norms that once protected our institutions are coming unmoored.” Or, as Vox’ Dylan Matthews put it in a column earlier this week: “the death loop that American democracy appears to be trapped in.”
But American democracy as a whole remains healthy, as seen in the robust resistance to Trump within the government, the courts, and the public at large. The disease is localized within the Republican Party. Which is why, if indeed American democracy is in a death loop, any solution must not focus solely on ousting Trump, but on punishing and reforming the GOP.
The big takeaway from the first year of Trump’s presidency is that the country’s institutions largely have checked him. “President Trump followed the electoral authoritarian script during his first year,” Levitsky and Ziblatt argue in their book. “He made efforts to capture the referees, sideline the key players who might halt him, and tilt the playing field. But the president has talked more than he has acted, and his most notorious threats have not been realized.... Little actual backsliding occurred in 2017.”
Other prominent Trump critics tend to agree. “The year 2018 begins much as 2017 did, with advocates of American democracy holding their breath to see whether it can withstand the assaults of an autocrat in the Oval Office. In 2017, the restraints mostly held,” New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait acknowledged in early January. Weeks later, Vox’ Zack Beauchamp wrote:
"Trump’s assaults on democracy have, for the most part, been repulsed. The courts, the federal bureaucracy, the states, and even large numbers of ordinary Americans have all played a vital role in restraining the president’s authoritarian tendencies.... America’s core institutions may not be in perfect health, but they seem to be functioning well enough to constrain a president who’s gone after essential parts of its democratic system. When it comes to the most basic question for any democracy—can it sustain itself?—the answer right now is a surprisingly clear yes."
Trump called on the FBI and the Department of Justice to attack his political foes, including Hillary Clinton, and pledge loyalty to him; the agencies have refused to do so. Meanwhile, the courts have denied Trump on issues like his travel ban, which originally targeted seven Muslim-majority countries and, after being struck down, had to be modified multiple times; the latest version is now being considered by the Supreme Court. And voters themselves are acting as a counterweight to presidential power. Republicans have vastly underperformed in every special election since Trump took office, and Democrats stand a good chance of winning back the House of Representative and possibly even the Senate in the midterm elections this fall.
But one institution has sorely failed in its constitutional duty to restrain the president. Time and again, the Republican-controlled Congress has ignored, defended, or outright enabled Trump’s authoritarian excesses.
“Donald Trump doesn’t have much of an agenda of his own and he has struck a bargain with people in Congress who do have agendas that he will sign bills that are very unpopular, that probably certainly no Democratic President would sign and probably few first-term Republican presidents would sign,” Frum said during the Brookings event. “He will sign those bills if in return he is given protection for actions that no president in American history has ever dared undertake, including running a massive global influence business while president.”
Levitsky and Ziblatt, as well as Matthews, point to polarization as a major cause of this crisis in American democracy. “Some polarization is healthy, even necessary, for democracy,” Levitsky and Ziblatt wrote. “But extreme polarization can ******* it. When societies divide into partisan camps with profoundly different worldviews, and when those differences are viewed as existential and irreconcilable, political rivalry can devolve into partisan hatred.” But they seem reluctant to place blame. “Polarization ... encouraged politicians to abandon forbearance, beginning with the Gingrich-era government shutdowns and the partisan impeachment of Bill Clinton,” they wrote. “Democrats are beginning to respond in kind. Their recent filibuster triggering a government shutdown took a page out of the Gingrich playbook.”
Only at the end of their Times op-ed do Levitsky and Ziblatt come out and say it: “Intensifying polarization, driven by an extremist Republican Party, is making constitutional hardball a new norm for party politics.” Which is to say, this crisis is not simply the result of polarization, but what William A. Galston and Thomas Mann in 2010 called “asymmetrical polarization”: The GOP has moved much further to the right than the Democrats have to the left. In doing so, the party has become more cohesive and extreme—more willing and able, that is, to shatter political norms to achieve their ends.
It is not, then, a crisis of American democracy at all, but a sickness in the Republican Party—one that took root with Newt Gingrich’s “Republican Revolution” in the 1990s, and which has only metastasized within the GOP since. (To the degree Democrats have broken norms, too, they have done so in response to—or in mimicry of—Republicans’ norm-breaking.) The ascension of Trump has only made this asymmetry starker, as Arizona Senator Jeff Flake—one of the few Republican willing to criticize his party today—made clear on Thursday. “I think for one thing, just in terms of what this does for the country,” he said, “we’ve got to have two strong, functioning parties, and right now our party has simply become—it seems—an apologist for certain actions of the president when we shouldn’t be.”
Historically, American political parties moderate themselves after suffering consecutive losses at the ballot box. Between 1932 and 1948, the Republicans were whipped in the presidential race five times in a row. This led the party to nominate a centrist who accepted the New Deal, Dwight Eisenhower. After the Democrats lost three times in a row from 1980 to 1988, they shifted toward the center with Bill Clinton, who triangulated between his party and the GOP. Such a losing streak might seem unimaginable today, with Republicans in control of both chambers of Congress as well as the White House. But it’s not implausible—and perhaps even likely, if one puts any stock in current polling trends—that come 2020, Democrats will control the White House and at least half of Congress.
This is not to preach complacency about the threats to American democracy today, or to claim that the ballot box holds the solution to every problem contributing to this crisis. Gerrymandering, for instance, appears to be a problem that only the courts, if anyone, can solve. Voters also have little power to limit the right-wing media’s profound influence on the Republican Party, rewarding extremism over responsibility. And even if Republicans are banished from power in the White House and Congress, they have shown just how effective they can be as the minority party; there are still many norms they can break. But unless Republicans pay an electoral price, there is little hope for it to become a functioning party again.
newrepublic.com
how-trump-is-destroying-the-republican-party
Apr 19, 2018 · Donald Trump has remade the Republican Party in his own image. Under his mismanagement and ineptitude, the GOP has become the party of corruption and plunder, kakistocracy, and white nationalism. Trump is dismantling the government and his party with it.
How Trump Is Destroying the Republican Party ...
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/2018/01/24/how_trump_is_destroying_the_republican...
Jan 24, 2018 · Under Donald Trump, the GOP no longer cares about the federal debt, states' rights or Russian aggression, says Robert Reich. Related Articles. How Trump Is Destroying the Republican Party. Under Donald Trump, the GOP no longer cares about the federal debt, states' rights or Russian aggression, says Robert Reich.
The Republican Party, Not Trump, Is the Real Threat to American Democracy
On Thursday morning, President Donald Trump called into Fox & Friends and went on such a rant that even the show’s conservative hosts seemed startled. “You look at the corruption at the top of the FBI, it’s a disgrace,” he said. “And our Justice Department—which I try and stay away from, but at some point I won’t—our Justice Department should be looking at that kind of stuff, not the nonsense of collusion with Russia.” As if to protect Trump from further embarrassment, Brian Kilmeade cut the interview short by saying, “We’d talk to you all day but it looks like you have a million things to do.”
This is what Trump’s critics have warned about all along: that he’s an authoritarian who would use the office of the presidency to destroy norms (like his attempts, as in the Fox interview, to undermine the independence of the Department of Justice). And in destroying those norms, some fear, Trump could destroy American democracy itself—or at least contribute to its decline. “Donald Trump is not the heart attack of democracy, he is the gum disease of democracy,” The Atlantic’s David Frum said during a Brookings Institution forum in February. “You can die from gum disease, but it festers for a long time before it finishes you off.”
But some Trump critics lately have argued that he’s not the disease at all. “The problems we face run deeper than the Trump presidency,” Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, the Harvard political scientists and authors of the recent book How Democracies Die, wrote in The New York Times in January. “While Mr. Trump’s autocratic impulses have fueled our political system’s mounting crisis, he is as much a symptom as he is a cause of this crisis.” The crisis, as they see it, is that “the norms that once protected our institutions are coming unmoored.” Or, as Vox’ Dylan Matthews put it in a column earlier this week: “the death loop that American democracy appears to be trapped in.”
But American democracy as a whole remains healthy, as seen in the robust resistance to Trump within the government, the courts, and the public at large. The disease is localized within the Republican Party. Which is why, if indeed American democracy is in a death loop, any solution must not focus solely on ousting Trump, but on punishing and reforming the GOP.
The big takeaway from the first year of Trump’s presidency is that the country’s institutions largely have checked him. “President Trump followed the electoral authoritarian script during his first year,” Levitsky and Ziblatt argue in their book. “He made efforts to capture the referees, sideline the key players who might halt him, and tilt the playing field. But the president has talked more than he has acted, and his most notorious threats have not been realized.... Little actual backsliding occurred in 2017.”
Other prominent Trump critics tend to agree. “The year 2018 begins much as 2017 did, with advocates of American democracy holding their breath to see whether it can withstand the assaults of an autocrat in the Oval Office. In 2017, the restraints mostly held,” New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait acknowledged in early January. Weeks later, Vox’ Zack Beauchamp wrote:
"Trump’s assaults on democracy have, for the most part, been repulsed. The courts, the federal bureaucracy, the states, and even large numbers of ordinary Americans have all played a vital role in restraining the president’s authoritarian tendencies.... America’s core institutions may not be in perfect health, but they seem to be functioning well enough to constrain a president who’s gone after essential parts of its democratic system. When it comes to the most basic question for any democracy—can it sustain itself?—the answer right now is a surprisingly clear yes."
Trump called on the FBI and the Department of Justice to attack his political foes, including Hillary Clinton, and pledge loyalty to him; the agencies have refused to do so. Meanwhile, the courts have denied Trump on issues like his travel ban, which originally targeted seven Muslim-majority countries and, after being struck down, had to be modified multiple times; the latest version is now being considered by the Supreme Court. And voters themselves are acting as a counterweight to presidential power. Republicans have vastly underperformed in every special election since Trump took office, and Democrats stand a good chance of winning back the House of Representative and possibly even the Senate in the midterm elections this fall.
But one institution has sorely failed in its constitutional duty to restrain the president. Time and again, the Republican-controlled Congress has ignored, defended, or outright enabled Trump’s authoritarian excesses.
“Donald Trump doesn’t have much of an agenda of his own and he has struck a bargain with people in Congress who do have agendas that he will sign bills that are very unpopular, that probably certainly no Democratic President would sign and probably few first-term Republican presidents would sign,” Frum said during the Brookings event. “He will sign those bills if in return he is given protection for actions that no president in American history has ever dared undertake, including running a massive global influence business while president.”
Levitsky and Ziblatt, as well as Matthews, point to polarization as a major cause of this crisis in American democracy. “Some polarization is healthy, even necessary, for democracy,” Levitsky and Ziblatt wrote. “But extreme polarization can ******* it. When societies divide into partisan camps with profoundly different worldviews, and when those differences are viewed as existential and irreconcilable, political rivalry can devolve into partisan hatred.” But they seem reluctant to place blame. “Polarization ... encouraged politicians to abandon forbearance, beginning with the Gingrich-era government shutdowns and the partisan impeachment of Bill Clinton,” they wrote. “Democrats are beginning to respond in kind. Their recent filibuster triggering a government shutdown took a page out of the Gingrich playbook.”
Only at the end of their Times op-ed do Levitsky and Ziblatt come out and say it: “Intensifying polarization, driven by an extremist Republican Party, is making constitutional hardball a new norm for party politics.” Which is to say, this crisis is not simply the result of polarization, but what William A. Galston and Thomas Mann in 2010 called “asymmetrical polarization”: The GOP has moved much further to the right than the Democrats have to the left. In doing so, the party has become more cohesive and extreme—more willing and able, that is, to shatter political norms to achieve their ends.
It is not, then, a crisis of American democracy at all, but a sickness in the Republican Party—one that took root with Newt Gingrich’s “Republican Revolution” in the 1990s, and which has only metastasized within the GOP since. (To the degree Democrats have broken norms, too, they have done so in response to—or in mimicry of—Republicans’ norm-breaking.) The ascension of Trump has only made this asymmetry starker, as Arizona Senator Jeff Flake—one of the few Republican willing to criticize his party today—made clear on Thursday. “I think for one thing, just in terms of what this does for the country,” he said, “we’ve got to have two strong, functioning parties, and right now our party has simply become—it seems—an apologist for certain actions of the president when we shouldn’t be.”
Historically, American political parties moderate themselves after suffering consecutive losses at the ballot box. Between 1932 and 1948, the Republicans were whipped in the presidential race five times in a row. This led the party to nominate a centrist who accepted the New Deal, Dwight Eisenhower. After the Democrats lost three times in a row from 1980 to 1988, they shifted toward the center with Bill Clinton, who triangulated between his party and the GOP. Such a losing streak might seem unimaginable today, with Republicans in control of both chambers of Congress as well as the White House. But it’s not implausible—and perhaps even likely, if one puts any stock in current polling trends—that come 2020, Democrats will control the White House and at least half of Congress.
This is not to preach complacency about the threats to American democracy today, or to claim that the ballot box holds the solution to every problem contributing to this crisis. Gerrymandering, for instance, appears to be a problem that only the courts, if anyone, can solve. Voters also have little power to limit the right-wing media’s profound influence on the Republican Party, rewarding extremism over responsibility. And even if Republicans are banished from power in the White House and Congress, they have shown just how effective they can be as the minority party; there are still many norms they can break. But unless Republicans pay an electoral price, there is little hope for it to become a functioning party again.
The Republican Party, Not Trump, Is the Real Threat to American Democracy
The president is just a symptom of a malignant disease within the GOP.
newrepublic.com
Does anyone actually believe that hard core criminal activity hasn't been involved in all government soon after the United States was established? Corruption has gotten worse in the last 50 years I personally know of. President Trump is not perfect, if the American people that hate him would open their eyes and look away from Trump, they just might see the largest part of Government Corruption from the real criminals in both parties. As I have heard even people on the right testify that Donald Trump is not a nice person. he is a extremely focused business man, trying to change Washington D.C. back to the control of the American people, at least to the extent to slow down the corruption. We need a big mouth egotistical leader that will not bend to other countries and our corrupt governing leadership.
we did that trump would have sold the place by the time we got turned back around!
he is that...…..trying to fuck the US and the rest of the world into putting more money in his bank account
is that why he is going all out to prove he is above the law.....if nothing to hide....release the info they are asking for
guess you haven't checked lately.....trump has the most corrupt administration in history!
he doesn't bend at all when it comes to our allies....hell he even lets them be slaughtered......but when it comes to Russia and a few other countries he does biz with he is as meek as a mouse
you want links to any of the above would be more than happy to post them....you guys just need to face the facts...he did comit impeachable offenses.....the right is just trying to delay things
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the same process the GOP set up when they impeached Clinton....and now...???
Republicans Fight Trump’s Impeachment by Attacking the Process
WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans introduced on Thursday a resolution condemning the Democratic-led impeachment inquiry, offering a symbolic objection to the investigation a day after Republicans in the House stormed a secure room in the Capitol to disrupt it.
Under pressure to defend Mr. Trump amid damaging revelations about his conduct, senators appeared to have settled instead on denouncing the impeachment inquiry that has uncovered them, giving anxious Republicans a chance to air their complaints about the process.
Led by Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina and the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, who has fiercely defended the president, the Senate resolution accuses Democrats in the House of conducting an unfair, secret inquiry designed to embarrass Mr. Trump without giving him the ability to defend himself.
“This is un-American at its core,” Mr. Graham said on “The Sean Hannity Show” on Fox News earlier this week. “What the House of Representatives is doing is a process of political revenge. It is alien to American due process.”
My how things change......
Did U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham Once Say a Crime Isn't …
www.snopes.com/fact-check/lindsey-graham-crime-impeach/
Impeachment is about cleansing the office. Impeachment is about restoring honor and integrity to the office. This is a genuine quote from Graham. Graham was one of 13 U.S. House Republicans from the judiciary committee who served as a “manager” (similar to a prosecutor) during the impeachment trial of then-President Bill Clinton.
Republicans Fight Trump’s Impeachment by Attacking the Process
WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans introduced on Thursday a resolution condemning the Democratic-led impeachment inquiry, offering a symbolic objection to the investigation a day after Republicans in the House stormed a secure room in the Capitol to disrupt it.
Under pressure to defend Mr. Trump amid damaging revelations about his conduct, senators appeared to have settled instead on denouncing the impeachment inquiry that has uncovered them, giving anxious Republicans a chance to air their complaints about the process.
Led by Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina and the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, who has fiercely defended the president, the Senate resolution accuses Democrats in the House of conducting an unfair, secret inquiry designed to embarrass Mr. Trump without giving him the ability to defend himself.
“This is un-American at its core,” Mr. Graham said on “The Sean Hannity Show” on Fox News earlier this week. “What the House of Representatives is doing is a process of political revenge. It is alien to American due process.”
My how things change......
Did U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham Once Say a Crime Isn't …
www.snopes.com/fact-check/lindsey-graham-crime-impeach/
Impeachment is about cleansing the office. Impeachment is about restoring honor and integrity to the office. This is a genuine quote from Graham. Graham was one of 13 U.S. House Republicans from the judiciary committee who served as a “manager” (similar to a prosecutor) during the impeachment trial of then-President Bill Clinton.
well he has pissed off and tried to blackmail Australia also...the Australian pm brought it up after the Ukraine thing...….but anyway pretty sure the trial will be here
what made you think it would be in Australia…..
I'm focused...I'm more than focused......matter of fact I am really enjoying all this Ukraine thing...this is better than sex!.....Schifty set nothing up...first it was the whistle blower...then 2 others coming forward to say the same thing...and then trump admitting it himself...think I posted something on all this today....Biden has nothing to do with anything...it has already been fact checked and found trump just wanting something to make Biden looked bad....don't you think if Ukraine had something they would have gladly given it to get the money....but then after trump gives them the money Rudy G and a couple others just funnel it back into trump and company to begin with....haven't you been keeping up.....nothing secret about it.....the right set up that system way back on Clinton...and used the same system with Hillary....the same system the right set up for both Clintons...and now it is unfair....the first few key witness give testimony...give names and etc...….then they open the hearings and call in the list of names they have been given by others...nothing sneaky about it....see some of my above posts...pay attention....we are better than this!
Oh my god.....you mean that guy that has been caught putting out phoney stories to get something started....to increase his listeners and his pocket book.....is there such a thing as an honest republican....I know they are all liars...must be crooks also
Haaaaaa haaaaaaaa haaaaaaaaaa
The truth will finally come out about all your machinations - Dems squirming all over the place - SOOOOOOOO obvious that the left will now try what they always do - to discredit the investigator - John Durham has impeccable bipartisan credentials - gonna be tuff - but let the ******* slinging begin - won’t hide the truth - your party is disgusting.
The truth will finally come out about all your machinations - Dems squirming all over the place - SOOOOOOOO obvious that the left will now try what they always do - to discredit the investigator - John Durham has impeccable bipartisan credentials - gonna be tuff - but let the ******* slinging begin - won’t hide the truth - your party is disgusting.
that's true the truth will eventually all come out....more coming out everyday....on several of his issue.from Ukraine......to his money laundering....to Russia.....Manafort in jail.....and not wanting to die there...think he may offer more info for a release......stone hasn't gone to trial yet….there is a whole more to come out on that......more former and current advisors to interview yet on several other issues....think the house has 3 different committees looking into some of his *******.........once a few see there are possible charges....they to will start to talk......with trump all of this is just the tip of the ice berg......and that is not covering all the state of NY and NJ have going on with him
they have far more on him than they had on Nixon....it's just that the right didn't like Nixon so they let him burn.....they don't like trump either.....but he signs a lot of those bills that they like.....but when more comes out and it eventually will ….and people see supporting him could cost them on re-election....they will drop him like a hot turd.....as for you trump supporters.....well even Nixon had a 29% approval rating as he was boarding the chopper to leave office
I'm betting he will negotiate a resignation....to keep out of jail
a lot on the right want him out also...he is a world wide embarrassment…...but they are afraid of his "twitter storm" on them if they speak up.....and don't want that with the elections coming up....see there are several not looking good for re-election....and when they see that door closing because of their support for him.....they will turn
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Republicans Abandoning Re-election Bids as Trump Fatigue ...
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/09/republican-party-donald-trump-midterms-2018
Sep 11, 2017 · Faced with a historically unpopular president and a stalled agenda, a growing number of Republicans in Congress are saying they will not run for re-election in 2018, increasing the odds that ..
Republicans look to the Senate as their fail-safe against ...
politicaldog101.com
republicans-look-to-the-senate-as-their-fail-safe...
Aug 27, 2019 · With Donald Trump not looking good for a re-election in the polls? Republicans are thinking about insurance should a Democrat US House and President is something they will face in 2021… While the early thought was the Republicans did NOT have to worry about holding their majority ion the Senate? Retirements, softening economy and Trump’s ...
Vulnerable Senate Republicans Shrink From Defending Trump ...
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/24/us/politics/senate-republicans-trump.html
9 hours ago · Senate Republicans up for re-election in 2020, fearful of straying too far from Mr. Trump yet at pains to defend him, have adopted a strategy of saying as little as possible.
Trumpdates: Republicans Are Tired of Defending Donald Trump
https://www.pajiba.com/politics/trumpdates-republicans-are-tired-of-defending-donald...
Oct 22, 2019 · Four Republican incumbent Senators are being outraised by their Democratic opponents. Things are not looking good for GOP Senators in Iowa, North Carolina, Arizona, and Maine, where House Speaker Sara Gideon raised $3.2 million in the third quarter, $1 million more than Susan Collins. I live in Maine. I just don’t see how Susan Collins survives.
While Trump rakes in cash, some Senate Republicans lagging ...
https://wtop.com/government/2019/10/while-trump...
1 day ago · WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is raising record amounts of cash for his 2020 reelection bid. But it’s not spilling over to the most vulnerable Republicans fighting to hold onto ...
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/09/republican-party-donald-trump-midterms-2018
Sep 11, 2017 · Faced with a historically unpopular president and a stalled agenda, a growing number of Republicans in Congress are saying they will not run for re-election in 2018, increasing the odds that ..
Republicans look to the Senate as their fail-safe against ...
August 2019
Aug 27, 2019 · With Donald Trump not looking good for a re-election in the polls? Republicans are thinking about insurance should a Democrat US House and President is something they will face in 2021… While the early thought was the Republicans did NOT have to worry about holding their majority ion the Senate? Retirements, softening economy and Trump’s ...
Vulnerable Senate Republicans Shrink From Defending Trump ...
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/24/us/politics/senate-republicans-trump.html
9 hours ago · Senate Republicans up for re-election in 2020, fearful of straying too far from Mr. Trump yet at pains to defend him, have adopted a strategy of saying as little as possible.
Trumpdates: Republicans Are Tired of Defending Donald Trump
https://www.pajiba.com/politics/trumpdates-republicans-are-tired-of-defending-donald...
Oct 22, 2019 · Four Republican incumbent Senators are being outraised by their Democratic opponents. Things are not looking good for GOP Senators in Iowa, North Carolina, Arizona, and Maine, where House Speaker Sara Gideon raised $3.2 million in the third quarter, $1 million more than Susan Collins. I live in Maine. I just don’t see how Susan Collins survives.
While Trump rakes in cash, some Senate Republicans lagging ...
https://wtop.com/government/2019/10/while-trump...
1 day ago · WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is raising record amounts of cash for his 2020 reelection bid. But it’s not spilling over to the most vulnerable Republicans fighting to hold onto ...
‘Out on a limb’: Inside the Republican reckoning over Trump’s possible impeachment
A torrent of impeachment developments has triggered a reckoning in the Republican Party, paralyzing many of its officeholders as they weigh their political futures, legacies and, ultimately, their allegiance to a president who has held them captive.
President Trump’s efforts to pressure a foreign power to target a domestic political rival have driven his party into a bunker, with lawmakers bracing for an extended battle led by a general whose orders are often confusing and contradictory.
Should the House impeach Trump, his trial would be in the Senate, where the Republican majority would decide his fate. While GOP senators have engaged in hushed conversations about constitutional and moral considerations, their calculations at this point are almost entirely political.
Even as polling shows an uptick in support nationally for Trump’s impeachment, his command over the Republican base is uncontested, representing a stark warning to any official who dares to cross him.
Across the country, most GOP lawmakers have responded to questions about Trump’s conduct with varying degrees of silence, shrugged shoulders or pained defenses. For now, their collective strategy is simply to survive and not make any sudden moves.
This account of the anxiety gripping the Republican Party is based on interviews with 21 lawmakers, aides and advisers, many of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk candidly.
Trump has been defiant in his defense, insisting his conduct with foreign leaders has been “perfect” and claiming a broad conspiracy by the Democratic Party, the intelligence community and the national media to remove him from office. Yet few Republican lawmakers have been willing to fully parrot White House talking points because they believe they lack credibility or fret they could be contradicted by new discoveries.
“Everyone is getting a little shaky at this point,” said Brendan Buck, who was counselor to former House speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.). “Members have gotten out on a limb with this president many times only to have it be cut off by the president. They know he’s erratic, and this is a completely unsteady and developing situation.”
Republican officials feel acute pressure beyond Trump. The president’s allies on talk radio, Fox News Channel and elsewhere in conservative media have been abuzz with conspiratorial talk of a “deep state” coup attempt and accusations that House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) and House Democrats are corrupting the impeachment process.
The GOP’s paralysis was on display this past week in Templeton, Iowa, where a voter confronted Sen. Joni Ernst (R) at a town hall meeting Thursday over her silence about Trump’s conduct.
“Where is the line?” Iowa resident Amy Haskins asked in frustration. “When are you guys going to say, ‘Enough,’ and stand up and say, ‘You know what? I’m not backing any of this.’
Trump’s extraordinary public request that China investigate 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden — adding to his previous pressure campaign on Ukraine — has sparked divergent reactions among other Republican senators, including over whether the president was being serious when he delivered his plea.
Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), the most outspoken of his colleagues, tweeted Friday: “By all appearances, the President’s brazen and unprecedented appeal to China and to Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden is wrong and appalling.”
“I can say, ‘Yea, nay, whatever,’ ” Ernst replied. “The president is going to say what the president is going to do.”
By contrast, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) dismissed it as a joke. “I don’t know if that’s a real request or him just needling the press, knowing that you guys were going to get outraged by it,” Rubio told reporters.
On Saturday, Trump on Twitter swatted back at Romney by calling him “a pompous ‘ass’ who has been fighting me from the beginning” — a flashing signal to other Republicans that there would be consequences to speaking out against the president.
Colin Powell, who served as secretary of state under George W. Bush, said during a panel sponsored by the New Albany Community Foundation in Ohio that “the Republican Party has got to get a grip on itself. Republican leaders and members of the Congress . . . are holding back because they’re terrified of what will happen [to] any one of them if they speak out.”
Some House Republicans have tried to offer a more forceful defense than their Senate compatriots.
But House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s shaky appearance last weekend on CBS’s “60 Minutes” was widely panned, even among senior GOP aides, and raised questions about whether he was up to the task of protecting Trump. The California Republican falsely accused his interviewer, Scott Pelley, of misrepresenting a key phrase in the transcript of Trump’s July 25 call with the Ukrainian president.
But some Trump aides privately said the president likes the messages sent by surrogates such as McCarthy and White House policy adviser Stephen Miller, who are willing to sit for a grilling and disparage the media, according to two Republicans close to the president.
“For Republicans to get weak, well, they have a very short memory,” Meadows said, noting that his colleagues facing competitive primary races will need Trump’s support.
Former Republican senator Jeff Flake, a Trump antagonist, said his former colleagues believe the foreign leader interactions under investigation in the House represent “new territory” compared with past challenges, including the Russia investigation.
“There is a concern that he’ll get through it and he’ll exact revenge on those who didn’t stand with him,” Flake said. “There is no love for the president among Senate Republicans, and they aspire to do more than answer questions about his every tweet and issue. But they know this is the president’s party and the bargain’s been made.”
A torrent of impeachment developments has triggered a reckoning in the Republican Party, paralyzing many of its officeholders as they weigh their political futures, legacies and, ultimately, their allegiance to a president who has held them captive.
President Trump’s efforts to pressure a foreign power to target a domestic political rival have driven his party into a bunker, with lawmakers bracing for an extended battle led by a general whose orders are often confusing and contradictory.
Should the House impeach Trump, his trial would be in the Senate, where the Republican majority would decide his fate. While GOP senators have engaged in hushed conversations about constitutional and moral considerations, their calculations at this point are almost entirely political.
Even as polling shows an uptick in support nationally for Trump’s impeachment, his command over the Republican base is uncontested, representing a stark warning to any official who dares to cross him.
Across the country, most GOP lawmakers have responded to questions about Trump’s conduct with varying degrees of silence, shrugged shoulders or pained defenses. For now, their collective strategy is simply to survive and not make any sudden moves.
This account of the anxiety gripping the Republican Party is based on interviews with 21 lawmakers, aides and advisers, many of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk candidly.
Trump has been defiant in his defense, insisting his conduct with foreign leaders has been “perfect” and claiming a broad conspiracy by the Democratic Party, the intelligence community and the national media to remove him from office. Yet few Republican lawmakers have been willing to fully parrot White House talking points because they believe they lack credibility or fret they could be contradicted by new discoveries.
“Everyone is getting a little shaky at this point,” said Brendan Buck, who was counselor to former House speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.). “Members have gotten out on a limb with this president many times only to have it be cut off by the president. They know he’s erratic, and this is a completely unsteady and developing situation.”
Republican officials feel acute pressure beyond Trump. The president’s allies on talk radio, Fox News Channel and elsewhere in conservative media have been abuzz with conspiratorial talk of a “deep state” coup attempt and accusations that House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) and House Democrats are corrupting the impeachment process.
The GOP’s paralysis was on display this past week in Templeton, Iowa, where a voter confronted Sen. Joni Ernst (R) at a town hall meeting Thursday over her silence about Trump’s conduct.
“Where is the line?” Iowa resident Amy Haskins asked in frustration. “When are you guys going to say, ‘Enough,’ and stand up and say, ‘You know what? I’m not backing any of this.’
Trump’s extraordinary public request that China investigate 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden — adding to his previous pressure campaign on Ukraine — has sparked divergent reactions among other Republican senators, including over whether the president was being serious when he delivered his plea.
Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), the most outspoken of his colleagues, tweeted Friday: “By all appearances, the President’s brazen and unprecedented appeal to China and to Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden is wrong and appalling.”
“I can say, ‘Yea, nay, whatever,’ ” Ernst replied. “The president is going to say what the president is going to do.”
By contrast, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) dismissed it as a joke. “I don’t know if that’s a real request or him just needling the press, knowing that you guys were going to get outraged by it,” Rubio told reporters.
On Saturday, Trump on Twitter swatted back at Romney by calling him “a pompous ‘ass’ who has been fighting me from the beginning” — a flashing signal to other Republicans that there would be consequences to speaking out against the president.
Colin Powell, who served as secretary of state under George W. Bush, said during a panel sponsored by the New Albany Community Foundation in Ohio that “the Republican Party has got to get a grip on itself. Republican leaders and members of the Congress . . . are holding back because they’re terrified of what will happen [to] any one of them if they speak out.”
Some House Republicans have tried to offer a more forceful defense than their Senate compatriots.
But House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s shaky appearance last weekend on CBS’s “60 Minutes” was widely panned, even among senior GOP aides, and raised questions about whether he was up to the task of protecting Trump. The California Republican falsely accused his interviewer, Scott Pelley, of misrepresenting a key phrase in the transcript of Trump’s July 25 call with the Ukrainian president.
But some Trump aides privately said the president likes the messages sent by surrogates such as McCarthy and White House policy adviser Stephen Miller, who are willing to sit for a grilling and disparage the media, according to two Republicans close to the president.
“For Republicans to get weak, well, they have a very short memory,” Meadows said, noting that his colleagues facing competitive primary races will need Trump’s support.
Former Republican senator Jeff Flake, a Trump antagonist, said his former colleagues believe the foreign leader interactions under investigation in the House represent “new territory” compared with past challenges, including the Russia investigation.
“There is a concern that he’ll get through it and he’ll exact revenge on those who didn’t stand with him,” Flake said. “There is no love for the president among Senate Republicans, and they aspire to do more than answer questions about his every tweet and issue. But they know this is the president’s party and the bargain’s been made.”
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