The (Republican) Civil War Will Be Televised
Factions battle for future of GOP over the airwaves
The legal walls may be closing in around former president Donald Trump, but watch enough cable TV news and you'll see a Republican Party very much at war with itself over its future — and Trump's role in it.
And you have a GOP riven between those, on the one hand, who not only are more than happy to believe Trump's “Big Lie” that he was the rightful winner of the 2020 presidential election and that victory was “stolen” by Democratic fraud — but want to continue to continue to follow Trump as some sort of chosen conservative messiah.
And those on the other who see the 2022 midterm elections coming up quick and the historical opportunity they present the GOP as the out-of-power party to retake either the House, Senate or both — but only if they ditch Trump and all of the conspiracy theories, and once again begin looking like a mainstream political party.
All of this is playing out for your viewing enjoyment on cable news.
“I do think there are a bunch of them, particularly who are running for president in 2024, or hope to, who definitely have been hoping for a long time that President Trump will be indicted and no longer be a problem. I’m sure that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell shares that view,” RealClearPolitics associate editor and columnist AB Stoddard said. "But the MAGAverse where Donald Trump is still president and raising hundreds of millions of dollars off of his persecution complex, it is a place where people have to rise up to his defense and call this a witch hunt. He will be keeping up huge narrative all throughout. He’s holding rallies soon.
"And he will put pressure through the fervent support of his base and all of the small-dollar donations and all of his rhetoric about people persecuting him, from the Democrats to media to judiciary to law enforcement. He’ll be keeping it up,” Stoddard added. “That puts pressure on the average Republican who either serves in a red district, a Trump district, or is a senator looking in cycle for his endorsement. That really means that you’re going to hear a lot of the same kind of comments they make about the Big Lie, things like, ‘Well, you know, I’m not saying the judges were wrong about saying there wasn’t fraud, but there’s just a lot of questions.’
“And so as long as he’s keeping up the witch hunt and there are no indictments, which could go on for a long time — and even if there are indictments, I think Republicans are going to fall in line and just tell us there are too many questions,” she said.
Republican Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, a staunch Trump supporter, and former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows this week both appeared on Sean Hannity's Fox News program and each fervently told viewers that Trump was certainly running for reelection in 2024.
And a group of Republican state governors also appeared on Hannity's show — including governors of states Trump didn't win — essentially, and in some cases it seemed reluctantly, pledge fealty to Trump.
Consider this exchange among Hannity, and governors Doug Ducey of Arizona, Kim Reynolds of Iowa and Chris Sununu of New Hampshire:
HANNITY: "Real quick, yes or no, it’s Donald Trump still the leader of the Republican partner?"
DUCEY: "Well, he's the former president, he's the largest voice —"
HANNITY: "Is he the leader?"
DUCEY: "Let's be the 75 million plus party, let's be a party of addition."
HANNITY: "Is he the leader?"
DUCEY: "Yes."
REYNOLDS: "Yep."
HANNITY: "Is he the leader?"
SUNUNU: "I don’t think anyone defines the leadership of the party. It’s defined by principles, by core values, by good governing."
HANNITY: "Is it 'America first', 'Make America great again'?"
SUNUNU: "Absolutely. It's all part of it."
Then there are the brave elected Republicans — an increasingly endangered species — who are actively pushing back on that notion.
That would include Georgia's lieutenant governor, Geoff Duncan, who appeared on CNN to make the case that Republicans simply must move on from Trump.
"Look, I think more and more Republicans are waking up every day, whether they like Donald Trump or not, and realizing that he’s not going to be the 47th president and that we need to put together a new plan and new approach that plays on the things that he did well,” Duncan said. “You know, he’s an outsider, change agent, business guy. But we have to do better. We obviously have to message better and remind folks of the policies that make sense and put a better direction. You know, it just blows my mind that folks on my side of the aisle are not holding Joe Biden accountable for what quite honestly is a bad direction for this country.
"You know, we’ve got massively increasing inflation, we’ve got instability in all types of labor markets. We’ve got real problems and we should be holding him accountable,” Duncan added. “That’s the winning strategy for Republicans in 2024.”
And, finally, there are those Republicans going on TV essentially trying to have it both ways, like longtime GOP pollster and message man Frank Luntz.
“We should want to hear. We have every right to disagree. And what the Trump people said, I don't agree with. And there are a couple of moments in that focus group that I got agitated with what they had to say. But they should be heard,” Luntz said during a segment of MSNBC's Morning Joe. "If we’re not going to create another Donald Trump situation, if we’re going to find some way … we need to know — we have to say, we need to know what they think.
"Even if we violently, emotionally, morally disagree, we’ve got to hear. Because in hearing, you can actually solve, you can actually heal,” Luntz added. “And yeah, I was surprised, but I think your viewers need to hear that stuff.”
No wonder people look at the Republican Party look as schizophrenic.