For all the talk about support Trump those who refuse to vote lose races across the countrythat’s not the whole story.
Surprisingly, given abstinence messages from voters in the midterm elections145 people refused to vote in the new Republican caucus, more than 6 people 139 people oppose the 2020 vote counting in the current Parliament. Their rank increased in Senatethe same goes for Trump’s courtiers winning Ohio and North Carolina.
They are willing to exert great influence over the GOP in Congress, sowing chaos and weaponizing their power to get precise concessions from the less fortunate leaders who are too weak to stop them. them and too grateful to the former president to stand up to the MAGA invasion.
“The insurgents are willing to be insurgents even after the January 6 violence makes you wonder what they want to do with that power if there is another Trump candidate.” . You have to expect them to act responsibly, but they may not,” said Ned Foley, a law professor at Ohio State University specializing in US elections.
The lame duck session currently underway may be the last breath of sanity before the frenzy takes hold. Passing the Electoral Reform Act of 2022, Foley says, is crucial to preventing another January 6 in 2025 — if Trump or some other MAGA-backed candidate isn’t happy with the outcome. . The reform significantly raises the limit for legislators to raise objections and removes governors from the equation, a reform that eliminates the risk that could arise if an electorate like Kari Lake were to reject the election. take office.
“The people of Arizona know BS when they see it,” Lake tweeted after CNN called the gubernatorial race for Democrat Katie Hobbs.
Another key item is raising the debt ceiling, which Republicans have said they will refuse to do unless the Biden administration agrees to scale back spending on the social safety net, fueling the shadow of a Republican. about the possibility of default.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-CA, speaks after his nomination as Speaker of the House at the US Capitol in Washington, DC on November 15, 2022.
Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images
Michael Thorning, managing director of Bipartisan Policy Center, said there was a “strong unifying desire from the Democrats” to avoid the political chicken game that accompanies action that is unpopular but necessary to pay the country’s bills. Republicans are reluctant to give up leverage, but some remember that during the Obama years, policy at the brink of war caused a drop in U.S. credit. “Before that, everything was theoretical. We’re playing with live ammunition here,” Thorning said.
Norm Ornstein, a far-right American Enterprise Institute (AEI) political scientist, cost taxpayers $18 billion the last time the GOP held the debt ceiling hostage. “Electoral denialist is shorthand for radical. Half of them don’t know what the consequences are, and the rest are eager to blow things up.”
If the debt ceiling is not raised during the lame duck session, it will fall into the hands of the new Congress “and the right-wing ability to take us off a giant economic cliff is frighteningly high above zero,” Matt. Bennett told the Third Way, a group of moderate Democrats. “When you play political chicken, you need to make sure that both sides know that collapse is a bad choice. I don’t know if this group of MAGA Republicans was aware of that when the default occurred.”
Kevin McCarthy, potentially the next Speaker of the House, will have the smallest margin since 1932, when 17,000 veterans and their families marched to Washington—as the Bounty Army— claim the promised relief for their service in World War I. Dave Wasserman with Nonpartisan Cook’s Political Report likened McCarthy’s slim majority to “Marjorie” —showing how much respect he will have to show for extremists like Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene to secure his fragile power.
McCarthy survived the test early in his caucus, but still faces weeks of negotiations to secure the backing he needs for a House vote in early January. Ornstein, who has written extensively about Congress, including his 2016 book, said: “McCarthy is the weakest, weakest and most morally compromised leader I have ever seen in my career. 50 years close to this process. It’s even worse than it looks.
Republican Tom Davis represented northern Virginia in the House from 1995 to 2008, chaired the NRCC (Republican National Campaign Committee) from 1998 to 2002. He told The Daily Beast. that there are “commercial tricks” that McCarthy can use to win the ring. If a small number of members — say, five to seven — abstained, that would bring the number needed for the majority to drop to less than 218, and McCarthy has committee chair positions that are not covered. he can promise to skip, in addition to a “Trump card,” assuming the former president is willing to swing his hand to put the man he calls “my Kevin” in the position of Speaker.
“Everybody acts in their own self-interest,” Davis said. “McCarthy knows where his caucus is. McCarthy needs Trump. If Trump pulls the rug out, he’s not a Speaker. None of these people like Trump. Everyone acts in their own interest. They follow Trump not out of loyalty, it’s self-interest.”
Trying to explain how many other sensible lawmakers have fallen into the grips of Trump and his Big Lie, Davis recalled pleading with Republican members on Jan. a person with a doctorate. that opposing the 2020 election certification “will mark you for life,” was only told if he did not do this, he would be in the primaries. Another Republican legislator did the right thing, Davis said, and when he returned to his county two days later, a woman came up to him, not to compliment him. to say, “Do you think they’ve learned their lesson?”
If the past is just a prologue, we can expect more of the same from election deniers. What the midterm election results changed was the nature of the response. The Republican media elite, primarily Rupert Murdoch and The Wall Street Journal editorial board, is moving away from Trump’s desperate attempt to return to the White House. Democrats don’t need to be on the defensive until 2024.
When voters choose their next president, they will do so after witnessing for themselves how Republicans hold power in the new Congress. Voters want more than a clown show.
