Chris Christie, causing problems for Donald Trump and the Republicans
Once again, Donald Trump‘s troubles are dominating the political landscape, and the Republican Party. Trump was in federal court in Miami on Tuesday, being arraigned on 37 felony counts involving his theft from the White House, retention and obstruction of justice in hindering the FBI’s retrieval of many boxes of classified documents, most of which were held at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach. If convicted on many or all of the charges, Trump could spend the rest of his life in prison.
None of this helps the Republican Party, which is trying to gear up for the 2024 elections and does not hold the White House or the U.S. Senate majority. Instead of gaining traction with a 2024 theme, elected Republicans are spending their time explaining how much they support Trump, and there is plenty of disagreement among them.
On one hand, Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives are trying to help Trump by hindering the investigation by Special Counsel Jack Smith that led to the latest indictments. For example, Rep. Jim Jordan, the Chair of the House Judiciary Committee, wants Smith “to testify or provide information about the special counsel probe of Trump’s handling of classified documents.” Likewise, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene “is proposing Congress defund the special counsel’s office.”
In contrast, however, a growing number of Republicans are publicly saying that, if Trump is the party’s nominee, he cannot win the 2024 presidential election. The list includes, for example, U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy, as well as his Senate colleague John Cornyn (who says that “Trump’s time has passed him by”). Senate Minority Whip John Thune went a step further, endorsing Trump rival Senator Tim Scott for the nomination. Former U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan also weighed in, stating that Republicans can only beat President Biden in 2024 if they “nominate anybody not named Donald Trump.” According to Ryan:
He’s [Trump] got a great core of support, and in a primary that’s what you build off of. So it does matter. But I think the electability argument is going to become more salient with this event and whatever happens in the future … it’s going to make it easier to make the argument to his supporters he’s not electable.
Ryan added, “He’s going to cost us the Senate again, he’s going to cost us House seats, and we want to win.”
Then there are well-known Republicans who are focusing on Trump’s latest indictment (his second one, for those counting) as particularly devastating. In this group, Trump’s former National Security Adviser John Bolton went the furthest, recommending that Trump withdraw from the 2024 presidential race. According to Bolton:
I think this is a potentially catastrophic turn of events for him. It certainly should be, because if proven in trial … it should put Trump in jail for a long time.
Likewise, Trump’s former Attorney General William Barr bluntly stated that:
I was shocked by the degree of sensitivity of these documents and how many there were… and I think the counts under the Espionage Act that he willfully retained those documents are solid counts…. If even half of it is true, then he’s toast.
Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie deserves special mention as the one Republican who is running against Donald Trump for the Republican presidential nomination, and who is attacking Trump most directly. At his CNN town hall on Monday night, Christie agreed with Barr:
The conduct in there is awful. I mean, put aside taking the documents in the first place. But then when you start getting asked, nicely, with a letter from the [National] Archivist, “could you please give them back?” And you ignore it …. Then they come with a grand jury subpoena. And then, according to the indictment, you tell your lawyers, “tell them we don’t have anything,” even though you have dozens and dozens of boxes of material. That’s obstruction of justice if it’s true.
Among Trump’s other declared 2024 presidential competitors, former Vice President Mike Pence, until now a Trump defender, changed his tune after reading the indictment, saying he “cannot defend what is alleged,” and that:
The very prospect that what is alleged here took place — creating an opportunity where highly sensitive classified material could have fallen into the wrong hands, even inadvertently — that jeopardizes our national security [and] puts at risk the men and women of our Armed Forces.
–Finally, former South Carolina Governor Nimarata “Nikki” Haley, like Pence, shifted to a more critical view about Trump:
If this indictment is true, President Trump was incredibly reckless with our national security…. This puts all of our military men and women in danger, if you were going to talk about what our military is capable of or how we would go about invading or doing something with one of our enemies.
However, Haley also says that if Trump is convicted and she is elected President, she would pardon him.
This variety of Republican reactions raises several uncomfortable questions: How many leading Republicans ultimately will split from Donald Trump? How far will they separate themselves from him? How much will they disagree with each other? At a time when party unity is a key to electoral success, how much disarray and damage will the GOP suffer as a result of Trump’s behavior and refusal to leave the political scene?
It may be that the only truly reliable Trump voters in 2024 are the hard core MAGAs (including a few members of Congress, apparently), who obey Trump like a cult leader, but whose numbers simply aren’t large enough to win him the general election. As Paul Ryan explained, however, these MAGA voters probably do number enough to give Trump the Republican Party presidential nomination.
Therein lies the dilemma for the GOP.
Photo by Alex Hanson, used under Creative Commons license. https://is.gd/xirwrC
