THE GREAT G.O.P. FREAK-OUT ENTERS ITS FINAL STAGE
Even the Republican National Committee is reportedly considering pulling its support.
"I just keep doing the same thing I’m doing right now,” Donald Trump told CNBC Thursday morning, deflating what hope remains among Republican Party leaders that their presidential nominee might pull himself together and start acting the part. “And at the end, it’s either going to work or I’m going to have a very, very nice long vacation.” The stakes for the G.O.P., however, are quite a bit higher. With Trump’s favorability dropping and his poll numbers in free-fall, a growing number of Republicans are coming to terms with the increasingly likely possibility that he will lose in a landslide—and sabotage dozens of down-ticket Republican congressional candidates in the process.
Like a necrotic limb, many are now looking for ways to isolate the disease—or amputate, if necessary—before Trump infects the rest of the party. On Thursday, over 70 G.O.P. congressmen and staffers sent an open letter to Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus, begging him to cut funding to Trump and redirect resources “to vulnerable Senate and House races” to stop the G.O.P. from “drowning with a Trump-emblazoned anchor around its neck.” With Trump’s support collapsing, they argue, “this should not be a difficult decision.”
The six-dozen dissidents aren’t the only ones looking to use the power of the R.N.C.’s purse to control or quarantine Trump. Priebus himself threatened to turn off the party’s money spigot, TIME reports, telling Trump in a phone call last week that the national party could divert its funds to House and Senate campaigns if he doesn’t get his act together. “Priebus reminded Trump that his title is R.N.C. chairman, not chairman of the Trump campaign,” Zeke Miller writes, citing two G.O.P. officials with knowledge of the call. Priebus reportedly told Trump that he would act in the best interests of the party. (“Reince Priebus is a terrific guy,” Trump responded to TIME. “He never said that.”)
Whether or not the R.N.C. decides to cut its losses with Trump, many G.O.P. donors and lawmakers are already distancing themselves from the party’s toxic nominee. Senator Susan Collins was the latest high-profile Republican to disavow Trump, joining donors like Meg Whitman, senators Mark Kirk andLindsay Graham, and a number of congresspeople, including Richard Hanna, Ilena Ros-Lethien,and Scott Rigell. Many running for reelection have refused to attend Trump events in their home states and districts, and one Colorado Congressman, Mike Coffman, went so far as to release an ad promising to actively oppose Trump if re-elected. Even diehard Republicans like Rep. Steve King, who recently made the news for his his comments on racial relations, told voters that Clinton was “somebody I can work with."
While Trump and the Republican Party raised a combined $82 million in July, the R.N.C controls how much of that money gets allocated—and recent events suggest that spending it on Trump could be throwing good money after bad. Over the last several weeks, the former reality-TV star has attacked a Gold Star family whose son was awarded the Purple Heart after fighting and dying in Iraq, implied that Hillary Clinton should be assassinated by “Second Amendment people”, claimed that Barack Obama “founded ISIS”, and warned his supporters that the U.S. electoral system is “rigged” and that the results may be illegitimate. (And then there was that report claiming that Trump is unnervingly interested in nuclear weapons.) Given the chance to walk back or clarify his argument that Obama founded ISIS, the White House hopeful insisted it was “no mistake” and doubled down, provoking another round of intra-party recriminations. “Trump is threatening the entire G.O.P. and it could take a decade to erase the damage,” Republican strategist Matt Mackowiac tweeted. “We are looking at an extinction-level event.”
Some Republican lawmakers see a silver lining. A Trump loss would allow the party to regroup, figure out what went wrong, and lay out a plan to take back the White House in 2020, anti-Trump congressmanCharlie Dent told The Hill. “Another autopsy will occur, and the next time, I hope lessons will be learned,” he predicted. Others aren’t so optimistic. “I think there are a lot of people within the party that think he’s a black swan and a one-time event that won’t have long-term repercussions following a defeat in November and I completely reject that,” Former Jeb Bush communications director Tim Miller said. “He’s not going anywhere.” If that’s the case, running away from Trump and the populist fervor he’s unleashed is likely an exercise in futility—albeit one that could, at least, leave some Republicans with a clearer conscience.
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