With the acquittal in his second “impeachment,” Donald Trump has shown that he maintains the reins of the Republican Party thanks to his enormous popularity among voters, who are already making the conservatives who wanted to find him guilty pay a high price.
One of the seven Republicans who supported the Democrats’ proposal to convict Trump for the assault on the Capitol is Bill Cassidy, senator from Louisiana and who last night was “censored” by the Republican Party of his state, in what is considered one of the greatest punishments that a local training can apply.
However, in an interview this Sunday on the ABC network, Cassidy was confident that time will make his decision understand the neighbors of Louisiana and considered that the formation should abandon the cult of Trump’s personality to return to its traditional values .
“The Republican Party is much more than a person. The Republican Party are ideas. We were the party that was founded to end slavery, we were the party that preserved the Union, we were the party that passed the first civil rights law, we were the party that ended the Cold War, “he claimed.
With those words, Cassidy portrayed the war that is being waged within the Republican Party to define his identity, now that Trump is no longer president.
THE BATTLE FOR THE SOUL OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY
Some of the Republicans want Trumpism to remain tied to the party that welcomed it in 2016 with the arrival of Trump; but others, like Cassidy, fear that this more radical wing will make them lose votes in the center and they bet on returning to the traditional values of the formation.
In addition to Cassidy, two other Republicans who voted against Trump received criticism from their constituents on Sunday. These are Senators Richard Burr of North Carolina and Patrick Toomey of Pennsylvania, who the next year will retire from politics, so they had more freedom than their co-religionists to vote in favor of a conviction.
In fact, of the seven Republicans who broke ranks, only one of them, Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski, is running for re-election in 2022; while three (Cassidy, Susan Collins and Ben Sasse) have just been re-elected, so they will not have to face the polls until 2026.
Meanwhile, Mitt Romney, a former Republican presidential candidate in 2012, has established himself as an opposition figure to Trump, something that enjoys some popularity in his state of Utah.
The fear of being the object of the wrath of Trumpism influenced, according to the Democrats, the decision that the majority of Republicans made to acquit the former president.
“If the vote had been secret, there would have been a conviction,” Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal said forcefully on Saturday.
In any case, few Republicans have defended the actions of the former president and the majority hid behind technical arguments about the constitutionality of the “impeachment” to avoid a guilty verdict.
The final score of the vote was 57 votes in favor and 43 against, far from the 67 votes that were needed to convict the former president of the position of “inciting an insurrection” in the assault on the Capitol on January 6, in which they died five people, including a policeman.
THE TEST BY FIRE: 2022
The result shows that there will be no imminent divorce between Trumpism and the Conservatives, in large part because Trump has made it clear that he intends to continue making headlines and rejects the idea of moving into a silent retirement, as former presidents have traditionally done.
In fact, the tycoon is scheduled to meet next week in Florida with Senator Lindsey Graham, one of his most faithful allies, to talk about the future of the formation.
In an interview with the Fox network this Sunday, Graham said that he had spoken with the former president after his acquittal and assured that he is “very excited” about the 2022 legislative elections.
Trump has confessed to some of his allies that he intends to use the 2022 election as an opportunity to reward those who have remained loyal to him and to punish those who have betrayed him.
In addition, the ex-president has opened the door to present himself again to the presidential elections in 2024.
For his part, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell has told his advisers that he plans to fight tooth and nail to defend traditional Republicans in the 2022 elections and prevent them from being challenged in the primaries by like-minded far-right candidates. to Trumpism.
TRUMP’S OTHER LEGAL MISASSES
However, McConnell knows that a direct confrontation could subtract votes from Republicans and is confident that the multiple investigations Trump faces will relegate him to a back seat in politics.
Specifically, the former president is being investigated in Georgia for his attempts to reverse the electoral result, he has a pending court case in New York for alleged financial crimes and the Prosecutor’s Office in the capital is investigating his role in the assault on the Capitol.
Still, around 70% of Republican voters continue to back Trump, whose support has declined markedly outside the party since the assault on Capitol Hill to the current figure of 37% of all Americans, according to average polls that elaborates the Five Thirty Eight website.
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