Trump's Role in Midterm Elections Roils Republicans
I came across this article on the MSN politics page. If nothing else it demonstrates the internal angst and chaos that the Republican Party is having with their own president. This article really is enlightening.
Trump’s Role in Midterm Elections Roils Republicans
The New York Times
By JONATHAN MARTIN, ALEXANDER BURNS and MAGGIE HABERMAN
2 hrs ago
WASHINGTON — President Trump is privately rejecting the growing consensus among Republican leaders that they may lose the House and possibly the Senate in November, leaving party officials and the president’s advisers nervous that he does not grasp the gravity of the threat they face in the midterm elections
Congressional and party leaders and even some Trump aides are concerned that the president’s boundless self-assurance about politics will cause him to ignore or undermine their midterm strategy. In battleground states like Arizona, Florida and Nevada, Mr. Trump’s proclivity to be a loose cannon could endanger the Republican incumbents and challengers who are already facing ferocious Democratic headwinds.
Republicans in Washington and Trump aides have largely given up assuming the president will ever stick to a teleprompter, but they have joined together to impress upon him just how bruising this November could be for Republicans — and how high the stakes are for Mr. Trump personally, given that a Democratic-controlled Congress could pursue aggressive investigations and even impeachment.
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Over dinner with the president and other Republican congressional leaders this month, Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and the majority leader, phrased his advice for the president in the form of a reminder: Mr. Trump should never forget his central role in the 2018 campaign, Mr. McConnell said, explaining that Republicans’ prospects are linked to what he says and does and underscoring that their one-seat advantage in the Senate was in jeopardy.
If Mr. McConnell’s warning was not clear enough, Marc Short, the White House’s legislative liaison, used the dinner to offer an even starker assessment. The G.O.P.’s House majority is all but doomed, he said.
But Mr. Trump was not moved. “That’s not going to happen,” he said at different points during the evening, shrugging off the grim prognoses, according to multiple officials briefed on the conversation.
The disconnect between the president — a political novice whose confidence in his instincts was grandly rewarded in 2016 — and more traditional party leaders demonstrates the depth of the Republicans’ challenges in what is likely to be a punishing campaign year.
Mr. Trump is as impulsive as ever, fixated on personal loyalty, cultivating a winner’s image and privately prodding Republican candidates to demonstrate their affection for him — while complaining bitterly when he campaigns for those who lose. His preoccupation with the ongoing Russia investigation adds to the unpredictability, spurring Mr. Trump to fume aloud in ways that divide the G.O.P. and raising the prospect of legal confrontations amid the campaign. And despite projecting confidence, he polls nearly all those who enter the Oval Office about how they view the climate of the midterms.
According to advisers, the president plans to hold a fund-raiser a week in the months to come and hopes to schedule regular rallies with candidates starting this summer. But there is not yet any coordinated effort about where to deploy Mr. Trump, and there are divisions within his ever-fractious circle of advisers about how to approach the elections.
Among his close associates, a debate is raging about whether to focus on House races that could earn the president chits with Republican lawmakers who might ultimately vote on impeachment, or to dig in to defend the party’s tenuous Senate majority.
“We need to be unified, and I know this is a frustrating business that we’re involved in, but rather than having circular firing squads, we need to be shooting outward,” Senator John Cornyn of Texas, the second-ranking Senate Republican, said of the White House.
Nearly every modern president has lost seats in his first midterm election, and Bill Clinton saw both the House and the Senate fall to Republicans in 1994. But given Mr. Trump’s polarizing administration, the results this fall are likely to hinge more than ever on the man in the White House.
Anger toward Mr. Trump has become a crucial motivating tool for Democrats. Already, Republicans have spent millions on House special elections in strongly conservative areas of Pennsylvania and Arizona, losing one seat and retaining the other by a relatively narrow margin.
At the same time, Republican leaders believe he is an essential force for savaging Senate Democrats and turning out voters on the right.
Yet congressional leaders remain deeply frustrated about Mr. Trump’s improvisational pronouncements. At the White House dinner, Mr. McConnell raised one such policy and expressed hope that Mr. Trump could resolve the matter of his proposed tariffs, which have instilled deep worry among farm-state Republicans.
“If we can get trade resolved that would be exceptionally important,” Senator James Lankford of Oklahoma said when asked in an interview how the president could help in the midterms.
Other Republican lawmakers have begun pleading with the president to be disciplined and hold up the growing economy and sweeping tax overhaul they passed in December.
“He’s always defied political convention, but this is a political convention I think that we should adhere to,” said Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, “which is to focus on that which is important to people, which is their wallet.”
When House Speaker Paul D. Ryan hosted a meeting of major Republican donors in Austin, Tex., this month, the head of the Congressional Leadership Fund, the primary House G.O.P. super PAC, delivered a presentation with a plea that the party “must sell the benefits of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act” to retain the House.
Mr. Trump, though, has little appetite to carry a singular tax-cuts-and-the-economy argument and is grousing about what he sees as uninspired messaging by congressional leaders like Mr. Ryan.
Appearing in West Virginia this month at an event meant to showcase the party’s tax agenda, Mr. Trump discarded his prepared remarks — even describing them as “boring” — and turned to more incendiary issues like immigration.
Eric Beach, a Republican strategist who leads a pro-Trump political committee, Great America PAC, said Mr. Trump was rightly suspicious of the political formula favored by conventional Republican leaders like Mr. Ryan and Mr. McConnell.
“He doesn’t think that’s how you win elections because that’s not how he won his election,” Mr. Beach said. “He knows and understands that the core issues of today are illegal immigration — including building the wall — and trade inequity.”
Congressional leaders have left little doubt in private that they see Mr. Trump as a political millstone for many of the party’s candidates. In recent weeks, Mr. McConnell has confided to associates that Republicans may lose the Senate because of the anti-Trump energy on the left.
And at Mr. Ryan’s retreat, a Republican pollster, Kristen Soltis Anderson, identified Mr. Trump as a major source of the party’s woes, according to multiple attendees. Ms. Anderson noted that his job approval was markedly weaker than past presidents, including President Barack Obama in the months before Democrats lost 63 House seats in the 2010 elections.
Mr. Trump, for his part, has complained to associates about having been deployed to campaign for relatively weak Republicans like Roy S. Moore, who lost last year’s Senate race in Alabama, and Rick Saccone, who lost the special House election in Pennsylvania last month.
He has taken the losses personally, particularly in Alabama, because the vacancy there was a result of his decision to make Jeff Sessions attorney general, an appointment he has since regretted. Mr. Trump has subsequently blamed others in the party for thrusting him into episodes of humiliating defeat.
The scars from those races have made Mr. Trump reluctant to weigh in on the race that Senate Republicans most want his imprint on right now: the contest to replace Senator Thad Cochran of Mississippi, who resigned this month.
Anger toward Mr. Trump has become a crucial motivating tool driving liberal and moderate voters to the polls.
The president met this month with Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith, the Republican appointee there and the favorite of the party establishment. Reflecting his fixation on personal loyalty, Mr. Trump quizzed Ms. Hyde-Smith on whether she had supported another candidate for president in 2016 before endorsing him. When Ms. Hyde-Smith said she had not, the president exclaimed that he needed more supporters like her in Washington, people briefed on the meeting said.
But his staff pointedly told her not to request the president’s endorsement at the meeting. White House officials have created a series of fund-raising and organizational benchmarks that they want to see the new senator reach before they make a decision — a sign of how wary they are of entangling a president sensitive to political setbacks in elections that Republicans are not guaranteed to win.
Despite the lingering disputes with congressional Republicans, White House officials say the president is eager to return to the campaign trail.
Although some Republicans in competitive states may not want to appear with Mr. Trump — Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, for example, has told associates he is unlikely to campaign with the president — there is no lack of lawmakers eager for his help.
Representative Lee M. Zeldin, Republican of New York, said he would welcome Mr. Trump on the trail anytime.
“I would expect the president and vice president to be in congressional districts all across the country,” Mr. Zeldin said. “I’ve gotten nothing but positive feedback on the desire of the president’s team to be as helpful as possible.”
Mr. Trump has also won praise on Capitol Hill for intervening in a handful of Senate races — including Mississippi, Nevada, North Dakota and Ohio — that were threatening to grow messy.
What has stunned Republican veterans outside the White House is how, even 15 months into his presidency, Mr. Trump still lacks any unified political organization.
John F. Kelly, the White House chief of staff and a retired Marine general, has scant political acumen. And while the White House political staff has sought to bring a measure of order, curbing some of the president’s knee-jerk endorsement tendencies, Mr. Trump does not necessarily view them as his primary political counselors.
This vacuum has, as is often the case with this White House, triggered fierce internecine scrapping among those vying for Mr. Trump’s ear.
The president’s announcement that Brad Parscale, his 2016 digital guru, would manage his 2020 re-election campaign caught many of his most senior advisers by surprise, according to multiple Republicans. And the hasty decision immediately raised suspicions it was part of a power play by Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, to isolate Corey Lewandowski, the president’s 2016 campaign manager and occasional adviser.
Mr. Parscale has rankled Trump advisers by giving the president a perpetually rosy assessment of his poll numbers. He often tells Mr. Trump his numbers have “never been higher,” according to two advisers.
Mr. Parscale has also irritated some Trump officials by attempting to take over the political portfolio, with his scheduling of meetings to devise an as-yet-unformed midterm strategy getting back to other factions.
But his ascension marks only the newest power center in Mr. Trump’s political orbit: There is his White House staff, his vice president, the Republican National Committee, his family, his campaign alumni, his super PAC, his congressional allies, his conservative media friends and now his re-election team.
All are expected to want a voice in Republican strategy for Mr. Trump in the midterms, adding only more chaos, as one White House official phrased it, to an already unruly presidency.
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These aren't democrats that are causing this chaos. This seems an awful lot like 2010 when President Obama was poison in many elections in deep red states and was gold in blue areas. The difference is that Obama had a 46% approval rating and Trump is 8% lower. That election was a nightmare for the democrats and it looks like the republicans are preparing for a similar or worse result in 2018.
In 2010 the economy was in the toilet, everyone’s home had taken a big hit in value, Obama was telling the successful they weren’t doing enough to support the bums and government was bailing out failed businesses. Things are different this year.
2010? Yea, that's when we finally started to turn around from the republican led recession.
Yes once the Republicans got control of the House and obstructed all of Obama’s proposals things started to get better. Then when they took control of the Senate making Obama a lame duck things improved even more.
Reality says that isnt true. The ACA is now quite popular among those who initially opposed the idea.
So doing nothing at all, helped the economy? LMFAO!!!!!!!! Ok.
The article was way too long and rambling to read, perhaps in the future we could get the"gist" version. And MSN is not known for being fair and balanced. The problem with the Democrats is that they are not offering anything other than they are "not Trump" to the voters. Gonna take more than that to win many seats.
Republicans have already been losing in special elections nation wide, the midterms are going to be an epic beating.
And they are still in the strongest position in eighty years when you combine national, state and local seats held.
After the midterms, I am doubting they will be. There are almost 40 republican congressmen retiring, that's a LOT of seats up for grabs. Even Paul Ryan is retiring, (and the grand old age of 48). His seat is being challenged by a liberal, and he is losing ground. Randy Bryce is most likely going to take Ryan's seat because there is no clear GOP candidate to oppose him and even if there was? Anti-Trump sentiment is strong nation wide.
I know that the republicans like to tout that Obama's democratic party lost 950 overall seats in eight years. That is an average of 118 seats a year. Pretty bad. Interesting, though....in his first year, the democrats only lost 24 out of 71 contested seats. The bleeding started in the midterms.
The republicans, on the other hand, have already lost 54 out of 73 contested seats this year. That is before the midterm wave hits. November looks more and more like an epic disaster for the republicans. With the number of republicans who have put their tails between their legs and retired, and the 12 to 18 % average move toward democrats in the special elections, this November looks more and more like a democratic feast.
I admit that it is a possibility the Republicans could be in for a loss this fall.
At least for the Republicans who haven't yet jumped Trumps sinking ship and still think they have a chance of winning. I think some will find that, like in some areas of states where the Republicans have held rule for decades, the Dems will be taking their seats.
Frankly, I don't blame those who have chosen to leave while the gettin' is good, to hold on to their own integrity and reputation. That is far more intelligent than hanging on the edge of a sinking ship until there is no choice left to them but to go down with the ship.
Don't be too sure. Even in the Reddest areas of many states have suddenly gone Blue.
I think you are thinking of Romney. And do you remember when Roy Moore was going to win Alabama by a landslide?
"He was a pedophile and still came close." Those words are yours. And that speaks loudly about the current state of this 'current GOP.'
VERY loudly! And they call themselves the 'Christian' party.
GOP is not the christian party and never were. The flag, the gun, the bible and the fetus have nothing to do with faith.
Agreed. But, that is what they promote their party as being. If only they lived the moral life they pretend to represent.
One thing I've been meaning to ask Trump supporters, when Hillary said "You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump's supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic -- you name it. And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up", which category do you place yourself? So many have accepted the "deplorable" title, but few vocalize which part they represent. Are you the racists? The sexists? The homophobes? Xenophobes? Islamaphobes? Which one are you? In the upcoming elections, which get's you out to vote more? Your homophobia? Your sexism? Which is it? You proudly wear the deplorable pins, but which deplorable characterization are you proudly claiming as your own? Or is it a bit of everything for you?
Let's just say she generalized millions of people, and, rightfully so, the other half thought she was talking about them.
Seems it's the libs that are getting busted for racism, sexism, sexual assault, homophobic posts, etc...
It seemed to me she was very specific but Trumpites took up the deplorable flag and wrapped themselves in homophobia, xenophobia, Islamaphobia, racism and sexism. I'm just wanting them to vocalize which of the deplorable attributes they represent most. Which group do the whiny scared little shits fear most? Gays? Muslims? Immigrants? Strong women or minorities?
I am all those adjectives and really could care a shit less what I am called, but I know what I am not.
I am not a hypocrite.
Faced personal racism four times in my life. I have learned to stay away from that minority group.
I applaud your honesty, admitting you have a problem is the first step to rehabilitation. Now maybe you can learn that staying away from certain racial "groups" does nothing but deprive you of personal growth and experience. And any minority who has actually experienced racism can't count it on one hand, being able to do that means you live an extremely privileged sheltered life.
I have and I love it. I, also, love who I am!
The racism was personal and totally uncalled for. So, they can shove it. Oh, I tried .....believe me, I did. But, on one of them when the proper authorities wouldn't address it, I just quit my job. I didn't like the job much anyway.....working on the 3rd floor in Oncology at our local hospital.
No more poor me. It is what it is. But, don't let anyone every convince you that minorities are peachy clean. They have their ways.
"I am all those adjectives"
Then I am truly sad for you.
"The only thing worse than being blind is having sight but no vision."
Helen Keller
I don't wrap myself in any of them. How it was taken, and rightfully so, was Hillary alleging that Trump supporters were whatever it was she called them. It doesn't matter if it was 1 or 100 million, every Trump supporter thought she was talking about them. Millions of past Obama supporters thought the same. Hence, we have a President Trump.
Than God.
Hmmmmm. the moderator "SP" is deleting posts for supposedly generalizing whole groups of people. You are calling Trump supporters "Little shits", which is a generalization of ALL Trump supporters, but yet, your hatred on this site still remains.
I wonder why?
No I don't.
I agree. My wife Is Filipina, and the only racism she has ever encountered is from the 13 percent of the population.
Deplorables, and yes, that was a really bad move by Hillary, she was so confident of winning that she actually denigrated the people who supported her opponent. Big mistake. It motivated anyone even thinking about possibly voting for Trump, to get off their asses and actually vote.
With this I totally agree.
Yep. She certainly did a good job of galvanizing voters to vote for Trump, and probably winning him new ones as well, but then as I see it (from afar) the insults flowing back and forth on this site concerning others' beliefs and attitudes is doing just that as well. That technique is not exactly bound to win over others to change their opinions. Isn't there a song called "Growing Up Is Hard To Do"?
Your problem is painting with too broad a brush. Most Republicans are none of those, just hard working, tax paying, patriotic citizens trying to clean up the liberal filth. I am a proud and out libophob though.
That part I voted up. the rest I ignored to do so.
You will never convince them that we are not. That is why I said......I am all those things. If he knew what I do personally for the underprivileged it would blow his mind. I think he needs to stay around.
Actions speak louder than words. So far conservative actions have done nothing but shout "I'm better than you! My race, my religion, my sexuality, all of my beliefs are all superior to you filthy minorities and liberals!". Conservatives fought to conserve slavery, segregation, bans on women and blacks voting, bans on interracial marriage and bans on gay marriage. Thankfully conservatives are always destined to lose as they always eventually do. That's the one thing they are really good at, losing.
Blah, blah. Are we still on the slavery thing? This is 2018. Is it still going on in the U,S,? If it is, I would like to know. Perhaps, you should concern yourself about child slavery and abuse and lets talk about the homeless that prevails today. Lets talk about the gangs, the illegal drugs, teenage prostitution.
No, you don't want to talk about that. You want to go back 200 years when there was black slavery. That's an easy topic and solution since it has already been dissolved. you want to carry on it, then, fine.
I am out.
No, I merely followed the trail of conservative battles which goes directly from the current fight over gay marriage all the way back to slavery. Conservatives have been disrespecting and discriminating against other Americans for centuries and it's no wonder, they believe themselves superior to the average law abiding tax paying American who happens to be liberal, gay or a minority. It doesn't take anything away from you if gays want to marry, but you want to take that right from them. In the past it's been voting rights you refused to allow because you feared blacks and women having their own voice, it's been preventing interracial couples because some dip shit white idiots feared their "white culture" would somehow be diminished, it's been fearful bigots who imagined some big black man "stealing" their white women because they aren't man enough to let women decide for themselves who they want to be with. It's been religious bigots who aren't ever forced to get abortions yet want to take away other woman's choice forcing them to carry fertilized eggs to term because if they don't then that means their religion isn't being validated.
I'm fine talking about real solutions to address homelessness and many other problems that afflict us today, but until conservatives accept the same set of facts as every other sane American we can't have a constructive conversation about solutions.
One of the problems that liberals face today is that the hate in the republican party defies logic. There is only one solution for everything that plagues this nation. Self-responsibility! The government should provide nothing, but the individual is able to provide everything. Sensible gun laws.....we don't need them. Gun owners are self-responsible. They don't need more laws...... social welfare programs.....we don't need them...People should be self-responsible and work 20 hours a day at 7.25 an hour to get out of poverty......homosexuality.....should be illegal.....the responsible thing is to pray away the gay. It goes on and on. Luckily, you're right. They're like Trump. They boast about "all that winning", while in the great arc of history all they get is "all that losing".
The mid terms are a long way away. Trump is campaigning, keeping his base close and making sure they remain loyal. Nothing fazes them. A liaison with an adult film actress would have utterly destroyed any politician, probably forever. But not Trump. Why?
Trump is already casting blame on individuals, setting the stage for public discontent is he loses.
And through all of this, Melania rarely smiles when she is next to Trump. And this too does not matter.
It may well be that if there have been illegalities deserving of impeachment for Trump, the republicans will be the ones that will have to bring them. Trump is serious. Tonight, in Michigan he hinted that millions of people will be angry if he is impeached. Is Trump setting the stage for Civil Disorder if he is forced to receive due justice?
Of course he is. And there are those here on NT who have promoted have a Civil War if Trump is Impeached. That says a lot about the mental instability of many of his base
Seems to me that making that point just emphasizes the pettiness and desperation of those who make it.
Still 6 months to go - lots of time to pull rabbits out of hats, and personally, I believe Trump was at least partially instrumental, whether directly or through Xi, in creating the rapprochement in Korea, and having the guts to support Israel in the way he has, and to cut the funding for a totally useless UNRWA (perfection in perpetuating hatred) antithesis of reality also shows a direction that previous presidents failed - decisiveness instead of being poodles (Anyone remember the erasing of "red lines"?). I have no skin in the US political game, but simply view it from afar, perhaps a little more objectively than an American is capable, perhaps only unconsciously, of being.
It is not petty and does not show desperation.
Why does Melania rarely smile when she is around Trump? What does she know that we don't?
Maybe at those times she's nervous - probably lots of explanations but of course you can speculate, it's your privilege.
Nervous? I think not.
My opinion is every bit as valid as your opinion - neither of us can prove what we may think, so no more reason to continue with this dialogue.
Painting the whole barn in one stroke ... or so it would seem from the comments
...
To vote against something .. or for something? Anger as a motivator does not policy make - so the 2018 midterms will be party above all else because of anger?
At least people will vote (?) even if they do not know what exactly they are voting for, nor whom they are voting for as long as it is not (R) because of anger towards Trump? - Reminds me of my Grandmother .. at 93 years of age, she asked for my assistance in voting .. we went over the sample ballot, candidates platforms and all initiatives on the ballot .... at the end of it all she told me to vote all (R)'s and NO on all initiatives - her reason was that is how my Grandfather had told her to vote!
Go luck to all the candidates in the midterms .....
The only thing you can say with certainty about Trump is that he will say and/or do something stupid every week between now and the day he leaves politics. THAT is a sure thing.
If there is any truth and reality to what has been said about "the dumbing down of America", then woudn't that make him fit in nicely with the majority?
The GOP is starting to see its error in Trump - they seem to think he's loyal to them. It doesn't work that way with Trump. He demands loyalty; he does not give it. He couldn't care less if he's causing harm to the party, so long as he's getting what he wants.
His weekend travels to Mar-A-Lago straining the description of the GOP as the party of fiscal responsibility? Tough. He's profiting from those trips, so he doesn't care.
His tariffs hurting the farmers who generally vote red? Too bad - he needs to be seen as the tough guy.