Tag Archive: Lisa Murkowski

Republican political hopefuls must gamble for or against Trump

The reality that is splitting Republicans apart

After the tumultuous events of last week, including Donald Trump‘s Mafia phone call to Georgia‘s Secretary of State to try to overturn their 2020 presidential election results, the shocking Democratic U.S. Senate runoff election sweeps in Georgia, the certification in the Congress of the Electoral College victory by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, and the deadly right wing terrorist invasion of the U.S. Capitol that temporarily halted such certification, many Republican politicians quickly had to make a choice: is their future political career or legacy safer siding with or against Trump? In other words, do these Republicans follow Donald Trump down the rabbit hole of conspiracy theories, rejecting and trying to overturn state-certified elections, and even inciting terrorism and sedition against the United States? Or do Republican politicians retain a basic belief in reality, government institutions, the 2020 election results, and democracy itself? Here’s where some of these Republicans have lined up in recent days:

Republican Senators sending mixed messages

Sen. John McCain at a recent hearing.

It was big news on Tuesday when Republican U.S. Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona took to the Senate floor to announce that he would not run for re-election, and to attack Donald Trump and fellow Republicans for enabling the Trump administration’s “flagrant disregard for truth or decency” and a “regular and casual undermining of our democratic norms.” Just hours later, however, Flake joined all but two of his Republican colleagues to strike down a new rule from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) that would have allowed class action lawsuits against financial institutions for predatory and deceptive business practices. This juxtaposition between words and deeds among Republican Senators is sending a mixed message to Americans.