The "Trump Paradox" of the Midterm Elections: The Stronger He Gets, the More Dangerous the Republican Party
Original Article Title: The Trump paradox: What's good for him is weighing down his party
Original Article Author: the Washington Post
Translation: Peggy
Editor's Note: The political paradox of Trump is becoming increasingly clear: while his national voter support continues to decline, he is gaining more and more dominance within the Republican Party.
The core of this article is not whether Trump can still influence the Republican Party, but how this influence is reshaping the party's electoral prospects. On the one hand, through endorsements, primary challenges, and political payback, he is forcing party candidates to pledge loyalty to him; on the other hand, this personality-driven political loyalty test may also weaken the party's competitiveness in the general election.
From Thomas Massie, Bill Cassidy, to the Indiana and Texas Senate primaries, Trump's "revenge politics" continues to demonstrate his mobilization power at the grassroots level of the Republican Party. However, the issue lies in the fact that winning internal primaries does not necessarily mean winning national elections. For the Republican Party, the real risk is not that Trump cannot control the party, but that the deeper his control, the narrower the party's space among independent and moderate voters.
More importantly, Trump's strength has not translated into effective legislative power. On issues such as the gas tax, voting rights bills, immigration funding, Iran military actions, there is still significant tension between him and congressional Republicans. This means that while Trump can compel party members to show loyalty, he may not necessarily be able to push them to bear the full cost of his political agenda.
Trump has built a party that is highly loyal to him, even if his executive actions have outraged a broader public, the Republican Party still chooses to follow. This political structure, however, has weakened his influence among voters outside his base.
For the midterm elections, the biggest variable the Republican Party is currently facing may not be the Democratic Party, but Trump himself. For Trump, victories in the primaries are consolidating his internal party authority; but for the Republican Party, these victories may also be pushing them towards a more challenging general election.
The following is the original article:
President Donald Trump walks across the South Lawn of the White House on Friday after arriving aboard Marine One. (Eric Lee/Pool/The Washington Post)
President Donald Trump does not believe in the so-called "law of political gravity."
Nationally, as his popularity continues to slide — multiple polls show his approval rating nearing historic lows — he is corralling the Republican Party ever more tightly to his will and, through a series of unpopular and even brazen actions, imperiling its prospects in the fall elections, in which the party is expected to serve as a referendum on his rule.
The result is a president who is unusually strong in demanding political loyalty from his party, but whose frequent executive actions have consistently alienated a broader public. The paradox has left him increasingly unwilling and seemingly unable to address through Congress the issues voters care most about. It is a cycle Trump seems neither inclined nor equipped to break.
On Tuesday, Trump claimed a prize he has long coveted: the ouster of Representative Thomas Massie, a libertarian Republican from Kentucky who is among Trump’s fiercest GOP critics in the House and who had led the charge for the release of government documents related to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Trump initially opposed the move but ultimately came around when he realized he could not stop it.
In a primary three days before, Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana also fell to defeat. Trump had labeled Cassidy as “very disloyal.” Five years ago, Cassidy had supported convicting Trump in the second impeachment trial surrounding the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Despite the senator’s attempts at repairing the relationship with Trump, often awkwardly, he ultimately could not even make the runoff.
Earlier this month, Trump’s revenge tour swept through Indiana, where Republican voters responded to his call by defeating five of seven state senators who had balked at redrawing the congressional maps as Trump demanded. One election remains too close to call, with the latest count showing a two-vote difference between the two candidates.
On Tuesday, Trump flexed his political muscles once again, endorsing Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in the Republican primary runoff against incumbent Senator John Cornyn. The move has left many Republicans on Capitol Hill disheartened, as Cornyn has long been seen as the stronger general election candidate. If Paxton prevails, the GOP may have to spend hundreds of millions of dollars in the deep-red state to ensure victory, funds that could have otherwise been used to support candidates elsewhere.
However, as is often the case, Trump made it clear that this decision was personal rather than tactical or policy-driven. While Collins has occasionally criticized Trump in the past, he has recently gone out of his way to court Trump, even proposing a bill not long ago to name one of America's longest highways after Trump.
But it was to no avail. Trump, in a social media post endorsing Paxton's statement, wrote, "John Cornyn is a good man, and I've enjoyed working with him, but he did not support me during my difficult times."
"I actually think that MAGA has never been more united than it is now," Trump told reporters on Tuesday. But if the Republican Party wants to continue controlling Congress in the fall elections, it must gain support from a significant portion of other voters. And in Trump's view, this election is crucial to his own political survival.
In January of this year, he told a gathering of Republican House members, "You have to win the midterms, because if we don't win the midterms, it will be—I mean, they will come up with some phony issue to impeach me. I will be impeached."
But now, the biggest drag on whether the Republicans can hold onto their slim majority in the House and Senate is Trump himself. The latest evidence came from a New York Times/Siena poll released on Monday: the public is strongly disapproving of Trump's handling of the war with Iran and his handling of cost-of-living issues. Even on his strongest immigration issue, Trump trails by 15 percentage points.
Among key independent voters, Trump's support has dropped to 26%. 47% of respondents said his policies hurt them, up from 41% last fall. And perhaps the most alarming poll finding for Republicans: Democratic voters are more enthusiastic about voting this year; in a hypothetical question of "if the election were held today, which party would you vote for," Democrats lead by 11 percentage points.
Meanwhile, even Republicans are uneasy about some of Trump's recent questionable actions. These include his earlier lawsuit against the IRS for leaking tax returns, seeking $10 billion in damages, and then settling with the IRS.
The agreement establishes a compensation fund, paid for by taxpayers, of up to $18 billion, to compensate those who claim they have been persecuted by a "politicized judicial system" like Trump. Beneficiaries are likely to include some of those who have been prosecuted for violent acts during the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters. At that time, Trump supporters tried to overturn his defeat in the 2020 presidential election.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota) on Tuesday, when asked about the fund, told reporters, "I'm not very supportive."
Democrats, on the other hand, are more direct.
Washington state Democratic Senator Patty Murray was blunt during a hearing attended by Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche: "This corruption has never been so blatant, and it has never been so widespread. But what's happening now is, you write the check, and Trump and his cronies cash it. And the hardworking American taxpayers who are already feeling the squeeze will foot the bill."
Under the settlement agreement, Trump and his son are prohibited from personally receiving funds from the so-called "deweaponization" fund. However, the IRS will also be "permanently enjoined and restrained" from collecting any unpaid taxes owed by Trump, his family members, or his businesses that arose before the settlement.
Despite Trump's show of force through executive actions, his political vulnerabilities have also weakened his ability to drive his agenda through the legislature. Many of his initiatives are currently stalled in Congress.
Neither Thune nor House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) have embraced Trump's call for a gasoline tax moratorium. The Senate has also resisted his push to end the filibuster. Trump hoped to use this to advance his top legislative priority, the "Save America Act," which includes a provision requiring people to prove their citizenship when registering to vote. Trump claims the bill is necessary to safeguard election integrity, but opponents argue it would lead to voter suppression.
Another recent source of frustration for Trump is the Senate rules adviser's refusal to allow hundreds of millions of dollars for his unpopular White House ballroom project to be shoehorned into an immigration enforcement funding bill under consideration.
For Trump, beyond the "halo effect" of defeating incumbent Republican lawmakers, there may also be a shadow. These individuals will remain in office until January next year, and are likely no longer as fearful of him.
On Tuesday, Cassidy, who had just lost the primary, staged a public rebellion: he voted for the first time in support of a resolution to prevent Trump from ordering further strikes on Iran.
In a statement, Cassidy said, "In Louisiana, I heard concerns from many people, including supporters of President Trump, who are worried about this war."
Back in February, Cassidy told The Washington Post in an interview, "I have some colleagues who are just waiting for their primary to be over so they can start to develop a more independent voice."
Given the current landscape, they may have to do so for their political survival.
Welcome to join the official BlockBeats community:
Telegram Subscription Group: https://t.me/theblockbeats
Telegram Discussion Group: https://t.me/BlockBeats_App
Official Twitter Account: https://twitter.com/BlockBeatsAsia
