Liz Cheney Says Her Re-Election Bid Will Be ‘Referendum On The Future Of The Republican Party’

On Wednesday, former GOP conference chair and Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney said that she sees her “re-election bid as a referendum on the future of the Republican Party.”

Cheney made her comments during an interview with the Wall Street Journal’s “Women, Power and Equity” event.

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Cheney: 2022 ‘Very Important In Terms Of The Future Of The Party’

Cheney said that voters are “potentially facing a choice between what she sees as traditional conservative values and loyalty to former President Donald Trump.”

She acknowledged that 2022 midterm election was going to be difficult for her, after she was booted from House Republican leadership earlier this month for repeatedly criticizing former President Donald Trump for his statements on the 2020 election.

Mrs. Cheney said the she “anticipates it’s going to be a hard-fought race.” She now also says openly she regrets ever supporting and voting for Trump.

“I really do think it’s one that will be a moment where the people of Wyoming can demonstrate to the country our commitment to the Constitution,” she said during her interview.

Cheney believes the 2022 election will be “very important in terms of the future of the party and the future of our republic.”

Cheney has at least four primary opponents so far – though she has outraised them all to this point.

Cheney Said She Refused To ‘Perpetuate The Lie’ That Trump Won The Election

Cheney was one of the ten Republicans who voted to impeach Trump during his second impeachment.

The Wyoming Republican said, “It became very clear that staying in leadership would require me to perpetuate the lie about the last election, perpetuate the big lie, perpetuate things that are dangerous.”

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Polls Not Looking Good For Cheney

She told the WSJ that “she hoped Republicans would begin to rally around traditional conservative policy issues like military spending” instead of Trump in the future.

A Club for Growth PAC poll showed earlier this month Cheney with a net negative image, with an unfavorable rating at 65 percent with a net rating of -36 percent.

52  percent also said they would rather vote for her opponent, no matter who it is. 

 

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Paul Ryan Set To Be Keynote Speaker At Never-Trumper Kinzinger’s Fundraiser

Former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-WI) will be the keynote speaker on Monday at a fundraising event for anti-Trump Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL). The event is a pricey one, according to Politico, ticket prices range from $250 to $11,600.

Kinzinger was one of ten Republicans who voted to impeach former President Donald Trump for what many critics of the former president say is his inciting of the riot that took place at the Capitol on Jan. 6.

Kinzinger, who now regularly attacks Trump, may well pay a political price for being outspoken in his contempt of the former president.

Of the ten GOP House members who voted to impeach Trump, nine, including Kinzinger, have at least one 2022 primary challenger, and the they all have the attention of The Donald.

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Ryan Also A Critic Of Trump

Paul Ryan left Congress in 2019 after a number of GOP House members and Senators announced they would not be seeking re-election.

While the official reasons range from running for governorships to House members running for the Senate, to the old standby of “wanting to spend more time with my family,” there is some thought that many of those incumbent House members and Senators were done with Donald Trump.

In 2016, Ryan told Republicans that they “should feel free to abandon Trump,” making it pretty clear that there was no effort to encourage Republicans to work with Trump when he took office. 

Paul Ryan has also been a critic of Trump. He called efforts by Republicans to challenge electoral college votes for President Joe Biden “anti-democratic and anti-conservative.”

After the election, Ryan also said that Trump should accept the results of the 2020 election, and “embrace the transfer of power.” 

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Kinzinger, Other Never-Trumpers Portrayed By The Media As ‘Rebels’

Much like his colleague Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY), who was recently removed from a GOP leadership position, Kinzinger is portrayed by the media as being someone who is alone in his beliefs, who is in a “its lonely at the top” position.

A February New York Times article describes him as someone who “now faces the classic challenge for political mavericks aiming to prove their independence.” 

Not only is he seen by other Republicans much like Cheney, as ignoring the direction voters want to take the party in, but soon after his impeachment vote, a cousin put out a very public letter in which she says that Kinzinger had disappointed the family, and that, “You have embarrassed the Kinzinger family name!” The cousin added that she wanted Kinzinger to be “shunned.”

Kinzinger recently formed a Political Action Committee with the goal being to “reformat” the party by emphasizing low taxes, defense, and social conservatism. The one thing not mentioned however, is an America First Agenda.

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Clear Lines Have Been Drawn

Having Paul Ryan speak at any GOP event sends a clear message not just to the party but to voters as well. There is no doubt that Donald Trump is now, and will likely remain, the most influential person in the Republican Party. 

But it becomes more and more clear that there are two distinct wings of the party. One sure way to gauge which one is more popular with voters will be when Donald Trump begins to hold rallies next month.

It will also reveal a lot about where conservative voters’ heads are leading up to 2022. Will they feel the need to chastise Adam Kinzinger and the others who voted to impeach Donald Trump by voting them out of office? 

Back in February, residents of Kinzinger’s district were asked about how they felt about his vote to impeach Trump.

One of those residents, a 63-year old retired mechanical engineer had this to say, “If you want to vote as a Democrat, vote as a Democrat. Otherwise, if you’re a Republican, then support our president. Trump was the first president who represented me. The stuff he did helped me.”

Adam Kinzinger may be “at peace” with his vote. His constituents might not be.

 

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Conservatives Are Lining Up To Primary Anti-Trump Cheney In Wyoming

On Wednesday, House Republicans ousted Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) from her position as GOP Conference Chair, and now challengers in Wyoming are lining up to oust her from her Congressional seat altogether.

As many as six people have already announced they will challenge Cheney for her House seat in the 2022 midterms. A defiant Cheney told reporters on Thursday that she “obviously welcomes” anyone who wants to throw their hat in the ring against her. 

“There are millions and millions of Republicans out there who want us to be a party that stands for principles and who are very worried about the direction that the party is going and don’t want the party to be dragged backward by the former president.”

Cheney has been an outspoken critic of former President Donald Trump, and has also spoken out about her concern with the direction of the Republican Party as influenced by Trump.

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Trouble For Cheney Started With Impeachment

Liz Cheney’s troubles began not long after her impeachment vote against Donald Trump. In February, Cheney was censured by the Republican parties of ten Wyoming counties. Some used phrases in their announcements of a censure like “betrayed the trust” of voters, and “devalued the political influence of the state of Wyoming.”

Cheney also survived an attempt in February to remove her from the Conference chair position, with even fellow Republican Matt Gaetz of Florida traveling to Wyoming to encourage voters there to remove her from office. 

Last month at a GOP retreat in Florida, calls for her to be removed from the Conference Chair got louder as Cheney was at odds with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) over the scope of a commission that is investigating the events at the Capitol on Jan. 6.

She also said that anyone who challenged the 2020 election results should be disqualified from being the 2024 GOP nominee – a clear shot at Trump.

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Who Are Cheney’s Challengers?

State Senator, gun rights activist, and Cheyenne-area business owner Anthony Bouchard was the first to announce he intended to challenge Cheney.

Another Wyoming legislator, a conservative radio host whose family owns Casper-area radio stations, State Rep. Chuck Gray has also announced he is running. 

Retired Army Colonel Denton Knapp, who currently lives in California but grew up in Wyoming and plans to move back, has thrown his hat in the ring. He said what prompted him was, “What’s missing right now is trust in our elected officials. Wyomingites expected Cheney to vote a certain way and she didn’t. As a result, she’s going through consequences.”

Also in the running is Marissa Joy Selvig, former mayor of Pavillion, a small town of 200. Selvig said, “I’ve never been a Cheney fan.” She added, “She has been working more for herself and for the Republican Party than she has the citizens of Wyoming. That’s what I see.”

Businessman Darin Smith is the most recent challenger to announce his candidacy. He announced his intention to run last week.

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Could Be An Uphill Battle For Cheney Opponents

Liz Cheney has a formidable track record when it comes to campaigning. She has beaten both Democrat and Republican opponents in the Cowboy state, and enjoys all the benefits of incumbency.

In the first quarter of this year, she raked in $1.5 million, her best fundraising quarter yet. Being the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, she enjoys universal name recognition and family legacy advantages, too.

Prior to being in the House, Cheney ran an ill-fated Senate campaign against then Senator Mike Enzi, but dropped out after only six months. Accusations of being a “carpet-bagger” dogged Cheney and claims that she had not spent much time in Wyoming until moving to affluent Jackson Hole in 2012.

Liz Cheney is free to do what she believes is right, but she might want to get home to see if the people in Wyoming agree with her.

 

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McCarthy’s desperation to be speaker unites an entire coalition against the GOP and its Big Lie

The more things change, the more they stay the same ... and the more they don't.

First off, what’s stayed the same (and there is simply no nice to way to say this): GOP Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is a lying sack of sh*t.

It's an observation McCarthy made necessary Wednesday, when he stood outside the White House following an Oval Office meeting and lied about House Republicans' fervent backing of Donald Trump's Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen.

Asked if he had any qualms about elevating Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York to a leadership post after she spent the last week spewing Trump's election fraud lies, McCarthy told reporters, "I don't think anybody is questioning the legitimacy of the presidential election. I think that is all over with."

To state the obvious, McCarthy joined 138 members of his caucus in voting to reject certification of the 2020 results. McCarthy also orchestrated the ouster of the only member of the GOP leadership team who has loudly and consistently rejected Trump's lies on the matter, Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming. McCarthy has also very publicly enlisted the help of Trump—chief promoter of the baseless fraud lies—in retaking control of the House next year. In essence, McCarthy has now built the foundations of House Republicans' 2022 strategy entirely on Trump's overt lies about "the legitimacy of the presidential election," as he put it.

As Cheney later told NBC News of McCarthy's debased leadership, "I think that he is not leading with principle right now ... and I think that it is sad and I think it’s dangerous.”

The operative word in Cheney's measured response is "dangerous." And when we look back on what is yet another pathetic and frightening episode in the Republican Party's continued detachment from reality, it may actually prove to be more of a turning point than it initially seemed.  

On Thursday, a group of about 150 high-profile disaffected members and former members of the Republican Party announced an alternative movement to help save democracy from the GOP, which they now view as a "material threat to the nation."

"We will not wait forever for the GOP to clean up its act," they wrote in a Washington Post op-ed. "If we cannot save the Republican Party from itself, we will help save America from extremist elements in the Republican Party."

The piece was authored by several people, including former Pennsylvania Congressman Charlie Dent, former George W. Bush secretary of transportation Mary Peters, and former Republican National Committee chair Michael Steele.

What exactly they are proposing is admittedly squishy. They are urging likeminded Americans to join their "Call for American Renewal," an alliance that will apparently back politicians from either party in an attempt to defeat extremist Republicans. 

"We will fight for honorable Republicans who stand up for truth and decency, such as Liz Cheney, Adam Kinzinger, Lisa Murkowski and Mitt Romney, to name a few," they write. "But we will not rely on the old partisan playbook. We intend to work across party lines with other Americans to oppose extremists and defend the republic wherever we can."

But perhaps the most important takeaway from their piece is the fact that they have declared the Republican Party to be an unsalvageable trash heap in its current form—a virtual wasteland of corruption, bereft of principled ideas and leadership.

"Tragically, the Republican Party has lost its way, perverted by fear, lies and self-interest. What’s more, GOP attacks on the integrity of our elections and our institutions pose a continuing and material threat to the nation," they write. 

They are no longer working to save the Republican Party as we know it today, even if they will work to protect certain members of it. They have effectively declared war on the party leadership and its unholy alliance with Trump.

It may seem merely symbolic, but it's important—the more prominent Republicans who are willing to take this step, the better for democracy. It will free up some longtime Republican voters who have been harboring misgivings about the party to either vote Democrat or independent or not at all in the next few election cycles. Any of those options are good ones from the standpoint of trying to save our democracy.

In the meantime, some Republicans working within the party plan to make life as difficult as possible for GOP leaders like McCarthy. Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, one of 10 who voted to impeach Trump, tweeted Wednesday that McCarthy "wrongly" assumes GOP members like himself would vote for McCarthy as House speaker if Republicans manage to win the majority next year. It's also true that Kinzinger may not survive to take part in that vote, but a group called the Republican Accountability Project plans to do as much as possible to protect the 10 House Republicans who voted for Trump's impeachment, including both Cheney and Kinzinger.

Another possibility that will make liberals queasy but would also make McCarthy's life hell is the idea of a Cheney run for president in 2024, which she didn’t exactly shoot down in her NBC interview with Savannah Guthrie. Asked about the prospect, Cheney ultimately said she would do “whatever it takes” to keep Trump from occupying the Oval Office ever again.

Sarah Longwell, executive director of the Republican Accountability Project and publisher of The Bulwark, pushed the idea of a Cheney bid for the GOP nomination in a Thursday post, but most certainly as a Republican, not a third-party candidate.

"Of course Cheney should run for president as a Republican," Longwell wrote. "She will almost certainly lose. But there is a long and noble tradition in running for president in order to shape a party, to organize and persuade voters, to lend prominence to an issue."

Cheney running for the GOP nomination would be the worst-possible-case scenario for congressional Republicans who have now bet their entire party on Trump. She would be a loud and constant reminder of the Big Lie they have embraced and the fact that they all sold their souls for political gain.

While no strategy is exactly clear or well-formed at the moment, it does seem like McCarthy's actions have advanced the thinking of some never-Trumpers and unleashed a more difficult political environment for the party overall. Many who had hoped that they could somehow influence the direction of the GOP without having to declare war on it appear to have been disabused of that notion. What happens now remains to be seen, but taking an action that cements an entire coalition against your cause is about the worst of all possible worlds for a supposed political leader. Congrats, McCarthy. 

For Donald Trump, Defeating ‘NeverTrumper’ Liz Cheney Is Top Priority For 2022

Making sure that anti-Trump Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney is defeated in her 2022 midterm primary election is a top goal for Donald Trump, according to a spokesman for the former president.

In an interview published on Saturday, Trump spokesman Jason Miller told the Washington Post that Trump’s political advisers have been calling Wyoming officials to discuss potential primary challengers to Cheney.

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Trump Committed To Seeing Cheney Defeated In 2022

Miller said that for Team Trump, unseating Cheney was “one of the highest priorities as far as primary endorsements go.”

Trump met with advisers in Florida as recently as Monday to begin analyzing 2022 campaign endorsements, according to sources close with the former president.

According to those sources, Trump wants to support a single candidate against Cheney. He does not want to divide the vote, knowing multiple challengers would make it easier for Cheney to retain her seat. 

Cheney is already in hot water back home in Wyoming for her vote to impeach Trump. 

She has already drawn primary challengers and was censured by County Republican parties in Wyoming for her impeachment vote.

This news comes in the wake of it being all but certain that Republicans will vote to remove Cheney from her role as House Republican Conference chairwoman this week.

Trump and other Republican leaders have endorsed Rep. Elise Stefanik to replace Cheney in Republican leadership.

Trump: Cheney Is A ‘Warmongering Fool’

House Minority Whip Steve Scalise and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy have signaled that they will support removing Cheney from her post. 

Scalise and McCarthy had previously defended Cheney as she faced attacks for her vote to impeach Trump earlier this year over his alleged role in the attack on the Capitol on January 6. 

Cheney has been a fierce critic of Trump, claiming that the former president’s efforts questioning the results of the 2020 presidential election have been damaging to the Republican Party and the country. 

In response, Trump called Cheney a “warmongering fool” in a statement.

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Trump also claimed Cheney “has virtually no support left in the Great State of Wyoming” and “continues to unknowingly and foolishly say that there was no Election Fraud in the 2020 Presidential Election when in fact, the evidence, including no Legislative approvals as demanded by the U.S. Constitution, shows the exact opposite.” 

Cheney responded to Trump in an op-ed for the Washington Post on Wednesday, writing “Trump is seeking to unravel critical elements of our constitutional structure that make democracy work — confidence in the result of elections and the rule of law.”

Cheney encouraged Republicans to avoid Trump’s “cult of personality.”

 

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GOP Divide Shows No Sign Of Letting Up As McCarthy Rips Cheney For Attacking Trump

The divide between the two wings of the Republican Party was as evident as ever at a party policy retreat held in Florida.

As House Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy emphasizes the need for the GOP to be united, the division between McCarthy himself and GOP Chair Rep. Liz Cheney will not be an incentive for others with differing visions of the future of the party to come together for 2022.

According to a report from Politico, while former President Trump was not at the policy retreat, his presence was very much felt in the rift between the anti-Trump Cheney and McCarthy’s calls for unity.

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McCarthy’s Frustration Comes Through

In an interview with Politico, McCarthy was asked about bringing the party together while Cheney – the third-ranking Republican in the House – continues to attack an extremely popular Trump.

McCarthy said, “There’s a responsibility, if you’re gonna be in leadership, leaders eat last, and when leaders try to go out, and not work as one team, it creates difficulties.”

In a telling exchange, McCarthy said that he had spoken to Cheney about playing down some of her comments. When he was asked if he thought she had taken the advice is answer was, “You be the judge.”

That wasn’t all. At a later press conference, McCarthy demurred when asked if Cheney was fit to lead the GOP. 

GOP Rift Is Nothing New

The ink on the Articles of Impeachment were barely dry when Liz Cheney began to lay blame for the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol building on Donald Trump.

In a tweet on Jan. 6 following the violence at the Capitol, Cheney said, “There is no question that the President formed the mob, the President incited the mob. He lit the flame.”

Other GOP members of Congress also joined in on pinning the blame on Trump.

Over in the Senate, the same occurred. Those that many Trump supporters view as “RINOs” (Republican in name only) were also quick to blame Trump. Then Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) immediately following the violence in Washington D.C. stated that, 

“The mob was fed lies. They were provoked by the President and other powerful people. And they tried to use fear and violence to stop a specific proceeding of the first branch of the Federal Government which they did not like. But we pressed on,”

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GOP Facing Classic Clash Of Establishment Vs. Young Guns

What is happening within the Republican Party may be nothing more than a simple case of the Establishment Old Guard clashing with relatively younger, more often newly-elected young guns of the party.

These latter are tired of the establishment status quo and are not afraid to take on the Democrats. 

The young guns are equally not afraid to take on members of their own party. On Monday, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said that not inviting Trump to the retreat was “stupid.”

Greene argued, “Remember when Republicans lost the House in 2018 because a bunch of them distanced themselves from President Trump? Not inviting President Trump to the GOP retreat is the same stupid behavior. Funny how they don’t understand a record # of votes and support of any R President.”

Greene is among a handful of Republican lawmakers, including Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) and Lauren Boebert (R-CO), who are not afraid to call out the senior members of the GOP.

Based on every known measure, Cheney is in the wrong as it regards Trump’s standing among GOP voters.

A February CNBC poll showed that 74% of Republicans want Donald Trump to stay politically active in some way, and 48% want him to remain the perceived head of the Republican Party. 

The Democrats have problems of their own in managing the AOC wing of their party, but a sizable GOP rift could bring them together quick.

The bottom line for Republicans is that Trump or no Trump, 2022 is fast approaching. 

 

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With a difficult midterm looming, Democrats have a short window to ban gerrymandering

After winning narrow victories to take full control of the federal government in the 2020 elections, Democrats have a fleeting opportunity to pass major legislation, with a window for action that may close in less than two years. Republicans will dominate the upcoming round of congressional redistricting, and the long-running tendency of the president's party to lose seats in midterms is well-known. But congressional Democrats can flip the script by banning partisan gerrymandering—a move that will both make elections fairer and give the party a better chance to prevail in 2022.

Republican victories in key legislative elections last year mean that the GOP is now positioned to draw new maps in states home to 38% to 46% of districts nationwide. Democrats, by contrast, will hold the cartographer’s pen in just 16% to 17% of all districts, giving the GOP an advantage of two or three to one. This disparity, combined with the threat that the increasingly right-wing Supreme Court may exacerbate the GOP's power to gerrymander within the states they control, means that, without further reforms, the congressional landscape is all but certain to remain skewed toward the GOP in 2022, following after two decades in which it already gave Republicans a large advantage.

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The House isn’t the only chamber where the playing field institutionally favors Republicans. The Senate does as well. Thanks to malapportionment and the legacy of a 19th-century GOP effort to carve out new states for partisan gain, Republicans have a major advantage in excess of their popular support. As a result, rural white voters possess disproportionate power at the expense of urban voters of color.

As our recently compiled spreadsheet illustrates, Senate Republicans have not won more votes or represented more Americans than Democrats since the late 1990s. Nevertheless, they’ve run the body just over half the time since, and this pattern of minority rule that existed continually from 2014-2020 may repeat itself next year. With more Americans increasingly voting straight tickets, it’s become almost impossible for Democrats to win the Senate unless the stars align as they did in 2018 and 2020.

The other major challenge Democrats face next year is that the president's party almost always loses a sizable number of seats in Congress in midterm elections, when opposition voters are energized to vote and the president's supporters are usually demobilized.

This dynamic has played out in every midterm since 2006, and the vast majority of them since World War II. The few exceptions include elections such as 2002, when the GOP benefited from George W. Bush’s post-9/11 surge in popularity combined with a pro-Republican shift in redistricting, or 1998, when Bill Clinton's approval rating peaked at over 60% amid the best economic growth cycle in decades and a backlash to the GOP’s impeachment efforts. Joe Biden is unlikely to benefit from such one-off factors, particularly since partisan polarization has only grown stronger in the ensuing years.

However, one mitigating factor for Democrats in 2022 is that, unlike in past midterms such as 2010 or 1994 when Democrats suffered massive downballot losses, Democrats have far fewer seats to protect that are hostile to their party at the presidential level.

In 2010, Democrats were defending 48 House seats that had voted for John McCain in 2008 and another 19 where Barack Obama won by less than his national margin. Democrats that November would go on to lose 50 of these 67 districts. The Senate story is similar: When Republicans flipped the Senate in 2014, Democrats were trying to hold seven seats in states that Obama had lost during his re-election campaign, and the GOP flipped all of them on its way to gaining nine seats that year. 

Following the 2020 elections, however, Democrats hold just seven House districts that voted for Donald Trump and another 15 that Biden won by less than his national margin of 4 points. In the Senate, none of the states that are up in 2022 went for Trump, though four backed Biden by less than his national margin.

While House Democrats are unlikely to suffer a setback anywhere near as monumental as the 63 net seats that they lost in 2010, the post-2020 Democratic majority of just 222 seats out of 435 is also much smaller than the 256 seats the party held going into the 2010 elections. A net loss of only five seats would be enough to flip the House back to Republicans, which is entirely plausible—if not likely—if 2022 proves to be a typical midterm. In the Senate, likewise, Republicans only need to capture a single seat to take back the chamber next year, compared to the six that they needed to flip in 2014.

A booming economy and an end to the pandemic may boost Democrats’ fortunes in 2022 by propping up Biden's approval rating, but the combined threats of GOP gerrymandering, Senate malapportionment, and the typical midterm penalty make Democrats the underdogs next year. Consequently, congressional Democrats must make the most of what limited time they have to pass reforms that are critical for preserving democracy from an increasingly authoritarian Republican Party.

Chief among those reforms is using Congress' constitutional powers to ban congressional gerrymandering by requiring states to adopt independent redistricting commissions and adhere to nonpartisan criteria when drawing new maps in order to promote fairness. House Democrats have passed just such a bill, the "For the People Act"—best known as H.R. 1—which also includes a historic expansion of voting access protections. But enacting it into law will require Democrats to overcome a filibuster, which means getting every Democratic senator on board with changing Senate rules.

Another critical piece of legislation that would reduce the Senate’s pro-Republican bias would be to grant statehood to Washington, D.C., which would end the disenfranchisement of 700,000 American citizens and add a heavily urban and Black state to a body that underrepresents both groups. However, D.C. statehood on its own would only give Democrats two more Senate seats at most and still leave the Senate with a large tilt toward the GOP. To level the playing field further, Democrats should also offer statehood to Puerto Rico, an idea the island voted in favor of in a referendum last year, and consider further ways to expand the chamber.

Most congressional Republicans supported Trump’s attempted coup d’etat following his defeat, underscoring that the party that controls Congress will also hold the fate of free and fair elections in its hands. It’s readily conceivable that a Republican-controlled Congress could simply reject an Electoral College results it doesn’t like in 2024, just as two-thirds of House Republicans voted to do mere hours after Trump incited an insurrectionist mob that stormed the Capitol.

To avoid this future of escalating autocracy, Democrats must pass serious structural reforms to our democracy while they still can. Time is short, and growing shorter.

McConnell Vs. Trump! Warring Wings Of GOP May Face Off In Alaska Senate Race

The Senate Leadership Fund (SLF) announced on Friday that it will support Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) in her re-election campaign.

The group is aligned with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who has said that he will “Absolutely” support Murkowski’s re-election bid.

Murkowski, often described as a moderate Republican, voted to convict former President Donald Trump during his second impeachment trial in January.

After her vote, the Alaska Republican Party voted to censure Murkowski for her conviction vote.

They also said that they would recruit a Republican challenger – which could set up a head-to-head matchup between the establishment wing of the GOP and Trumpworld.

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Race Will Be Portrayed As Experience Vs. Outsider

The 2022 midterm elections may come down to a simple matter of who decides the future direction of the Republican Party.

The McConnell-backed SLF had a war chest last election cycle of $475 million will now throw it’s weight behind not just Murkowski, but could also back a number of establishment incumbents like her.

SLF President Steven Law said, “Alaska needs the kind of experienced representation that Lisa Murkowski provides in the United States Senate. Whether fighting for Alaskan interests like expanding energy production and protecting fisheries, or advancing conservative priorities by confirming judges and cutting taxes, her strong leadership is vitally important to Alaska’s future.” 

In response to the SLF statement, Mary Ann Pruitt, advisor to Kelly Tshibaka – who is running against Murkowski in the GOP primary – released a statement saying, “It’s just like D.C. insiders to ignore the voices of Alaska voters to protect one of their own.”

Kelly Tshibaka is positioning herself as an outsider, saying in a video of her intent to run that Murkowski was “so out of touch” for voting to convict Trump after he had already left office.

Prior to her current run for Senate, Tshibaka has worked in the office of inspector general for the U.S. Postal service, Federal Trade Commission, and Department of Justice.

She resigned her position in Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy’s administration to concentrate on her run for the Senate. 

RELATED: Kathy Barnette Is Fighting To Become The First Black Female Republican U.S. Senator

Republicans Picking Sides

Within the Republican Party, it is starting to look like a matter of picking sides. That began to be apparent during the waning days of the Trump administration.

A new breed of Trump-supporting, outspoken Republican Congress members like Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene and Colorado Congresswoman Lauren Boebert came along.

Opposite that Trump wing stand establishment Republicans like Rep. Liz Cheney and McConnell.

From almost right after his second impeachment trial, Trump has had an eye on supporting any primary challenger of several members of Congress who had voted to impeach him.

It was thought that, should any of those Congress members received a primary challenge, Trump supporters would be fired up enough to support the challengers as well. 

Cheney garnered a primary challenge almost immediately following her impeachment vote. Several others have as well. Nearly every Republican Senator who had voted to convict Trump was censured by their local party. 

RELATED: Report: Biden Creating Commission To Study Court-Packing

Establishment GOP Should Know Trump Is Ready And Waiting For 2022

Donald Trump is already in position to endorse candidates and be a major player in the 2022 midterm election.

His new Save America PAC has, in the words of those in the know, ‘gargantuan’ amounts of cash. 

He has already began endorsing candidates, including Sens. Tim Scott (R-SC), John Kennedy (R-LA), Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC), South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster (R), and former White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders in her run for Governor of Arkansas.

Trump most recently endorsed Alabama Congressman Mo Brooks in his bid for the Senate, and America First Senator Rand Paul.

No word yet if Trump will be traveling to Alaska to give out an endorsement to Kelly Tshibaka. However, both wings of the party seem to be flush with cash, and 2022 could prove to be an interesting year.

 

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The GOP’s Dr. Seuss distractions couldn’t be more different than 2009 stimulus derailment strategy

We’re not in 2009 anymore. President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan (ARP)—which passed with only Democratic support—makes that clear. In 2009, also in the midst of a terrible crisis, we enacted a very different economic package, known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). The differences in content between the two are stark.

The current one is more than twice as large, delivers money directly to people who need it (rather than fruitlessly seeking bipartisan support, in part by including tax cuts which are far less effective in terms of impact), and is strikingly more progressive, more so than anything proposed by a president since LBJ, according to Ezra Klein—in particular in its approach to poverty. But equally stark is the difference between the Republican response this time versus 12 years ago.

Despite newly elected President Barack Obama’s inclusion of various elements Republicans should have supported, his 2009 stimulus package faced sustained and ruthless attacks from conservative politicians and, just as importantly, the right-wing media. At the time, the “de facto leader” of the Republican Party was Rush Limbaugh, whose audience size beat that of all his radio rivals. His assaults on the Obama stimulus package are representative of those put forth by the rest of the right-wing media ecosystem.

Day after day, the host attacked Obama’s plan—at a time when the president was immensely popular, more so than Joe Biden at a comparable point in his presidency. The Obama stimulus itself was broadly popular when it was enacted on Feb. 17, 2009, although it did not garner quite as much support as Biden’s plan does right now. Conservatives like Limbaugh made it their business to turn the American people against the bill, and not just by criticizing it on the grounds of small-government ideology. They had a good deal of success, in part because of flaws in the ARRA, but also because they were laser-focused on poisoning the discourse around it.

In addition to lying about the specifics, Limbaugh race-baited his listeners by slamming the ARRA as a “welfare payment”—a racially loaded term that conservatives going back to Ronald Reagan used as a dog whistle, to evoke stereotypical images of Black people supposedly not working while being supported by the government. The host linked the Obama plan to welfare in different ways, on numerous different broadcasts, and mentioned how “civil rights coalitions” supported the push to “redistribute” money by “taking it from you” (given that his audience was overwhelmingly white, we know who “you” referred to). He went after the bill for sending money to ACORN—which advocated for low-income folks and people of color, and worked to increase voter registration—despite the fact that the group got no money from the ARRA. Limbaugh also speculated baselessly that Al Sharpton and his group got stimulus funds.

The host also lied about the ARRA giving tax credits to “illegal aliens”—which did not happen. Additionally, he characterized the Obama stimulus as an “effort to buy votes,” and then immediately played an exchange of the president talking with a Latino student. In this and other similar segments, the host’s goal was to paint the plan as seeking to help those Black and brown people whom he depicted as wanting to avoid work. As Limbaugh told it, the ARRA was another plank in a race war fueled by Obama’s “rage”—and inspired by his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Bringing it all together on June 22, 2009, the host spewed the following racist claptrap: “Everything in the stimulus plan, every plan he’s got is reparations. … Redistribution of wealth, reparations … whatever you want to call it, it’s reparations.”

Although today’s Republicans are employing different tactics in opposing Biden’s plan, some habits are hard to break. South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham went after a provision aimed at helping Black farmers who suffered a century of systemic discrimination after the Civil War, using the same language as Limbaugh: “In this bill, if you're a farmer, your loan will be forgiven up to 120% of your loan if you're socially disadvantaged, if you're African American … some other minority. But if you're (a) white person, if you're a white woman, no forgiveness! That's reparations!” House Majority Whip Rep. James Clyburn, who hails from the same state, called Graham out: “He ought to be ashamed of himself. He knows the history in this country and he knows what has happened to Black farmers,” and added that his fellow South Carolinian ought to “go to church … Get in touch with his Christianity.”

Graham didn’t attack the overall bill in race-baiting terms, however. I’m not suggesting that’s because the 2021 version of the Republican Party has grown more enlightened on race since it fell under the sway of Donald Trump. It’s because the circumstances around the American Rescue Plan are different from those in play in 2009. Republicans haven’t stopped using racially or culturally divisive attacks as a way to distract from the unpopularity of their policy positions. It’s just that, with over half a million deaths that have affected all communities due to the COVID-19 pandemic, even they don’t think it’s a winning move to attack Biden’s relief bill on the same sort of race-baiting grounds, or with the same level of intensity, as they did Obama’s ARRA package.

Republicans can’t even successfully go after the ARP as “big government” overreach or for increasing the national debt, because they supported multiple COVID-19 bills last year that in total spent even more, not to mention their having busted the budget on Trump’s Rich Man’s Tax Cut in 2017. The last thing Republicans want to do is remind voters that they blew a trillion-plus dollar hole in the national debt and sent just about half of that money to the richest 5%, while Biden’s bill will put 70% of its money into the pockets of the bottom 60% of Americans by income.

Democrats must make sure voters don’t forget that. New York. Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney’s messaging nailed it: “We should shout it from the rooftops that we are passing historic legislation that will reboot the economy and end the pandemic. They're always ready to help a big corporation or a rich person, but when a working family needs help, the Republicans tell them to drop dead.”

Even Republican mayors—32 of them in fact, from states ranging from Oklahoma to North Carolina to Indiana to Arizona to Michigan—signed on to support the Biden plan. Directly countering lies from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell about “blue state bailouts,” Republican Mayor Bryan Barnett of Rochester Hills, Michigan, stated: “This isn't because of some gross mismanagement or some bad contracts that were signed or historic deficits. This is about addressing the needs of a global pandemic that are really (for) the same constituents they serve in D.C. that we're serving here at the local level.”

For multiple reasons, including the fact that their current leader, aka Mr. Former Guy, supported the main element—a check going out to most Americans—the Republican response to the American Rescue Plan has been “more muted” than 12 years ago, and that includes the response from Trump.

The Man Who Lost The Popular Vote (Twice) actually slammed his once and possible future ally McConnell over his opposition to those very checks. Republicans can’t seem to get on the same page when it comes to the specifics of the ARP, so it’s hard for them to condemn it in a coherent way. Sen. McTurtle has issued a few statements rebuking the relief package, but it’s nothing compared to 2009.

Rather than go hard after the ARP in the way Limbaugh had done with the ARRA a dozen years ago, Trump all but ignored it at his biggest and best opportunity: CPAC. He devoted only two sentences to the bill during a speech lasting an hour and a half, instead spending much more time talking about the election, impeachment, and those who truly demonstrated, in the words of Luca Brasi, their “ever-ending loyalty.” As for those who didn’t, they could sleep with the fishes as far as Trump—who has himself been accused of acting like a mafia boss—was concerned.

Instead, Trump and his party made a decision to attack Biden in a very incoherent way. This is not to suggest that they don’t know what they are doing, but rather that what they are doing is not going to work. They are banking on people, when they vote in 2022, somehow not remembering how bad the situation was when Biden took office, so that Republicans can then say that the ARP didn’t really do all that much, or wasn’t necessary in the first place—as Moscow Mitch just claimed on Thursday—or was just a bunch of progressive ideas (yeah, and people like those ideas). Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi is actually trying to take credit for the bill, even though he (and every other Republican) voted against it. Talk about incoherence. You know their attacks are pretty weak when they sound like this one, from Texas Sen. John Cornyn: “Unfortunately, there’s going to be a sugar high because free money is very popular … So this may be temporarily popular, but it’s going to wear thin over time.”

If you have to say twice that the bill is going to be popular, then maybe you’ve got a political problem here, senator. Republicans are already trying to “pre-deny” credit for the coming boom to Biden’s policies—even as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s analysis found that the American Rescue Plan would increase economic growth in our country by an impressive 3% over previous estimates, and would add over 1% to worldwide economic growth. That’s a Big Fucking … oh, forget it, everyone else has already used that line. It is a BFD, though.

There were a couple of other echoes of 2009 coming from conservatives. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and Utah Sen. Mike Lee issued a statement in early February criticizing the increased child tax credit that ended up in the final bill as “welfare assistance.” Chris Hartline, National Republican Senatorial Committee spox, went off about Democrats not caring if stimulus checks went to undocumented immigrants. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz has made similar complaints, and also carped about ARP money going to incarcerated prisoners.

However, there are two problems for The Man Who Threw His Own Daughters Under The Bus: first, his proposed amendment would have blocked 2 million American citizen children from receiving stimulus checks just because their parents are undocumented. As Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, the majority whip, noted: “These American kids should receive this relief just as other American kids do.” Second, the previous COVID-19 stimulus checks—the ones with the Orange Julius Caesar’s name on them—also went out to prisoners, something Cruz absolutely knew before the December COVID-19 bill was passed. Did he utter a peep about it when that bill was under discussion? I think you know the answer.

So, although conservatives have made their pro forma condemnations of the ARP, what they are actually spending the bulk of their time and energy screaming about these days reveals their fundamental strategy. Their goal is not to rile up their voters about what the president is doing—which will help just about every American—but instead distract them with totally unrelated culture war issues.

Do Fox News viewers even know about the American Rescue Act, the $1.9 trillion stimulus bill that passed the Senate? They might not. The network, like most right-wing media, has largely ignored the Covid-19 relief legislation, instead fixating on silly culture-war controversies involving Mr. Potato Head and Dr. Seuss. In the days leading up to the Senate vote, the network was far more concerned with the availability of Dr. Seuss’s Scrambled Eggs Super than it was with any aspect of the bill itself.

Want to guess how many times Fox mentioned Dr. Seuss just through March 3? Not one fish, and not two fish. Try 60 times, as counted by The Washington Post. Beyond the cancel culture crap, the Party of Trump has one arena of actual policy that it seems to think is worthy of more time, attention, and vitriol than COVID-19 relief: the great danger they insist is posed by transgender athletes. To his eternal credit, Florida (Man) Rep. Matt Gaetz combined two manufactured controversies in a single bank shot when, at CPAC, he quipped: “Mr. Potato Head was America’s first transgender doll and even he got canceled.” I haven’t seen anyone get this worked up about Mr. Potato Head since this guy yelled at his little nerdy buddy.

Just look at a snapshot of Fox News’ website after the ARP passed compared to that of CNN. The latter has the vitally important piece of legislation at the top, over the entire three-column page. The former leads with the Meghan Markle/Piers Morgan clash, and its largest mention of the president is in an article about how his “handlers” are, wait for it, “hidin’ Biden.” Yep, they’re still going with that campaign calumny about the guy who trounced Trump being somehow infirm.

Anything to avoid reality.

The Fox News website is an alternative universe from what the actual top news story is. pic.twitter.com/ONv5z7JE6M

— Richard W. (@IceManNYR) March 10, 2021

Why are Republicans following this strategy? After being fed political junk food for so long—especially by the demagogue who has led their party going on five years now—it’s the only thing their voters want to imbibe. These kinds of culture war attacks “unif[y] the party but expands it into the area we need to—the suburban moms, the college educated men that we struggled with in 2020, there’s common ground with these constituencies,” according to Mercedes Schlapp, who worked for the twice-impeached president. Republican strategist Matt Gorman added that such tactics represent “a cultural touchstone for folks that shows where a party's priorities are.” Famed Republican pollster Frank Luntz thinks they are “definitely” a good way to excite the right-wing base.

Daniel Cox, a researcher at the American Enterprise institute who has done extensive research about the topic, found that "concerns about cultural influence, political power and status are really overwhelming other ideological concerns on the right. Traditional conservative principles, whether it's commitment to a strong national defense or support for limited government, do not animate Republican voters." Other Republicans offered similar opinions.

Even the recently deceased Limbaugh typically used to tie his race-baiting attacks to larger ideological questions or at least policies under discussion in the moment—not that that’s praise, mind you. Now, however, the Party of Trump can’t even bother to do that, as per POLITICO: “Today, much of the fracas doesn’t even involve Biden, or his administration, or his policy agenda. Instead, it involves things like corporate decisions around kids’ toys.”

In the end, as Ron Brownstein pointed out, Republicans were unable to “ignite a grassroots backlash” against Biden's COVID-19 relief package. One Democratic pollster, Nick Gourevitch, saw a lack of passion behind the Republican attacks on the bill: “It doesn't seem like they are even really trying.” Brownstein reported that, off the record at least, a number of Republicans agreed.

For their part, the Biden White House is more than happy to put its actual policy accomplishments up against the trash the other side is throwing out there.

Joe Biden isn’t worried about culture war attacks over Dr. Seuss, Mr. Potato Head and Neanderthals. A White House official sends over a statement for our time.https://t.co/BmihkPQuDp More, w/ the great @meridithmcgraw pic.twitter.com/jWBU2ACQTE

— Christopher Cadelago (@ccadelago) March 5, 2021

One of the criticisms leveled at Obama—including by Barack himself—was that he didn’t always do a great job advertising his own achievements to voters. The 44th president acknowledged: “We did not always think about making sure we were advertising properly what was going on,” and added that his White House should have taken more “victory laps.” His veep, now the 46th president, appears to have learned the lesson well, as evidenced by the primetime address he delivered Thursday night.

Democrats think they have a winner with the American Rescue Plan, and it looks like they know how to tell the story of what they’ve accomplished.

DNC digital team w/ a Love Actually-themed response to covid package passage. Via @Adrienne_DNC pic.twitter.com/GPGX1Lmb5z

— Alex Thompson (@AlexThomp) March 10, 2021

The most recent polling shows not only that the American people favor the bill, but also that there’s a significant class divide that portends even more danger for the Party of Trump. Overall, 41% of Republicans like the ARP, which is bad enough for them. However, among the quarter of Republicans who are lower income, that percentage is 63%.

Pew finds a huge gap in support for Biden's relief bill between lower income and upper income Republicans -- nearly two thirds of lower income Republicans support it. pic.twitter.com/SPpDXILKjV

— Will Jordan (@williamjordann) March 9, 2021

Here’s the analysis from Daily Kos’ Kerry Eleveld: “This GOP divide along class lines gives Democrats a real opening to both win back some blue-collar voters as well as remind some Trump voters why they were never sold on the Republican Party to begin with (thereby discouraging them from turning out next year).”

It’s easy to say that, come the next election, the bullshit will win out over substance. We are Democrats, after all, which means we often see the glass as half-empty when it comes to electoral politics. But that’s not always how it plays out. Republicans may hope that if they just yell and scream about other, unrelated topics, voters in 2022 will forget that Biden’s relief plan significantly helped just about every American finally get past this devastating pandemic.

It’s up to all of us to help Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and the rest of the Democratic Party make sure voters remember who did that for them.

Ian Reifowitz is the author of The Tribalization of Politics: How Rush Limbaugh's Race-Baiting Rhetoric on the Obama Presidency Paved the Way for Trump (Foreword by Markos Moulitsas)

Trump Sends Warning To GOP – He Will Not Endorse ‘RINOS,’ Sends ‘Cease And Desist’ Order

On Monday, President Trump’s leadership political action committee, Save America PAC, sent out a notice warning the Republican Party that neither he nor his PAC will endorse ‘RINOs,’ or ‘Republicans In Name Only.’

The former President has been busy since leaving office.

Also on Monday, legal counsel for Trump sent cease-and-desist letters to the Republican National Committee, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and the National Republican Congressional Committee that orders them to stop using Trump’s name for their fundraising activities.

In the RINOs statement, Trump declared, “No more money for RINOS period. They do nothing but hurt the Republican Party and our great voting base – they will never lead us to Greatness. Send your donation to Save America PAC at DonaldJTrump.com. We will bring it all back stronger than ever before.”

RELATED: Biden DHS Secretary Reportedly Asks For Help With Border Crisis He Said Doesn’t Exist

GOP Pushing Back

In a report from Politico, the RNC is apparently refusing any such cease-and-desist order, and RNC Chief Counsel Justin Reimer stated that the committee “has every right to refer to public figures as it engages in core, First-Amendment protected political speech, and it will continue to do so in pursuit of these common goals.”

Essentially they claim that they are allowed to use Trump’s likeness and name because he is a public figure. 

While none of the committees who received cease-and-desist letters commented, some who work closely on GOP campaigns say that it is “impossible not to use Trump’s name because his policies are popular with the base.” 

Knowing that ‘RINOs’ will likely use Trump’s policies as mere campaign rhetoric, while governing as establishment Republicans, could be Trump’s impetus for his statements.

RELATED: Candace Owens Thanks NYT’s ‘Bigotry’ For Hispanics ‘Fleeing The Democratic Party’

Trump Already Endorsing Candidates

Republicans surely know that the one endorsement GOP candidates will want is that of Donald Trump.

He has already begun endorsing candidates for 2022 such as South Carolina Senator Tim Scott (R-SC), Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA), and Sen. John Boozman (R-AR).

He has also given an early endorsement to former White House Press Secretary  Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who has announced a run for Governor in Arkansas, and the re-election of Sen. Jerry Moran of Kansas.

But he’s not just bringing endorsements.

Trump stated on Saturday that he would be campaigning against Sen. Lisa Murkowski, one of seven Republican Senators who voted to convict Trump during his second impeachment trial.

She is the only one of the seven that is up for re-election in 2022.

Murkowski had some harsh statements for Trump immediately following the Capitol riot:

“On the day of the riots, President Trump’s words incited violence, which led to the injury and deaths of Americans — including a Capitol Police officer — the desecration of the Capitol, and briefly interfered with the government’s ability to ensure a peaceful transfer of power.”

“Such unlawful actions cannot go without consequence and the House has responded swiftly, and I believe, appropriately, with impeachment.”

Trump fired back in the way his supporters expect:

“I will not be endorsing, under any circumstances, the failed candidate from the great State of Alaska, Lisa Murkowski. She represents her state badly and her country even worse. I do not know where other people will be next year, but I know where I will be — in Alaska campaigning against a disloyal and very bad Senator.”

Trump also went on to criticize Murkowski’s vote to confirm President Joe Biden’s pick for Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland.

“Her vote to advance radical left Democrat Deb Haaland for Secretary of the Interior is yet another example of Murkowski not standing up for Alaska.”

RELATED: Hillary Clinton: Republicans Don’t ‘Pledge Allegiance’ To USA, They Pledge To Trump ‘Cult’

2022 Could Be Interesting Time For GOP

The next election cycle could be a tricky one for Republicans. Currently, there are only five seats separating them from taking back control of the House.

But in the Senate, there are several who have decided against running for re-election, and Democrats are most certainly eying those seats. 

Sens. Richard Burr (R-NC) and Pat Toomey (R-PA) have already announced they will not be seeking re-election. Toomey had voted for convict Trump.

On Monday, Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO) also announced he would not seek another term. Blunt holds several Republican leadership positions and is a close ally of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY).

In addition, Sens. Rob Portman (R-OH) and Richard Shelby (R-AL) are also retiring. This could give the United States Senate a very different look after 2022.

Trump and his PAC would most likely be involved in endorsing candidates for those seats. 

More Trump-endorsed Senators may be at odds with more moderate Republicans like Sens. Mitt Romney and Susan Collins.

It is an illustration that for many long-time GOP Senators, the Republican Party may no longer be their domain.

 

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