In my previous 2021-02-01 blog I talk about the power Ex-president Trump still has over Congress. I have wondered what fundamental issues the Republicans have that makes them so beholden to Trumpism.
After the Jan 6 attempted coup on the Capitol, Rep. Liz Cheney, (R, Wyoming) was one of the ten house Republicans who voted for Trump’s Impeachment. Now the other Republicans want to remove her from leadership position. Update – she survived the vote to remove.
Then there is the newly elected ‘far-right’ Republican representative from Georgia, Marjorie Taylor Greene, who had previously supported the Q anon conspiracies, and had ‘liked’ a threat to kill Nancy Pelosi on Facebook. McConnell said this was a cancer on the Republican Party. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mitch-mcconnell-marjorie-taylor-greene-cancer-republican-party/#app
If the Republicans don’t, then the House will vote to remove her from committees.
In this short video, Heilemann talks about some of the issues with the Republicans.
Here is how I’m taking it. The House Republicans now have a member who supports the far-right, and they are afraid to discipline her for fear of alienating the Trump supporters. Newsmedia is using this topic of extremism and the strain it puts on the cohesiveness of the Republican Party. The leadership of the Republican Party are trying to deal with the renegade factions, seeing that it’s necessary to keep them a part of the party because the Republicans desperately(?) need their votes. Yet the leaders are trying to punish the few in Congress who are condemning Trump for inciting the Capitol attempted coup. The Republican leaders are afraid of losing the Trumpist voters.
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Feb 4 Trump takes up Revenge as post-presidential hobby
They said Trump might run against Biden in 2024. Now that Trump in not incumbent, he will have to compete with other candidates in the primary. If the Republicans come to their senses, they will choose some other candidate. If Trump does run against Biden, the incumbent Biden has an advantage, if his approval ratings are good then it’s unlikely Trump will win.
And one other point that the Republicans will have to deal with is if Trump loses in an election, will he throw a tantrum and try to rally his ‘base’ to again storm the state Capitals and get the votes overturned?
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/04/donald-trump-revenge-post-presidency-hobby