How 'Never Trumpers' Crashed The Democratic Party

[Harry Walpurgisnacht]

MAY 5, 2020, AT 2:18 PM
By Perry Bacon Jr. at FiveThirtyEight

Anti-Donald Trump activism among conservatives — known informally as the “#NeverTrump” movement — started in early 2016 as a way to stop the businessman from winning the GOP nomination. It failed.

Even by the slightly broader standard of influencing Republican politics, #NeverTrump has been largely unsuccessful. Trump won around 90 percent of self-identified Republican voters in 2016, similar to past GOP presidential nominees. About 90 percent of Republicans have approved of Trump throughout his first term, similar to George W. Bush’s standing in his first four years in office. And with Trump as the face of the party, Republican congressional candidates won around 90 percent of the GOP vote in the 2018 midterms, just as in recent midterm elections. There is really only one anti-Trump figure among the 249 Republicans on Capitol Hill: Sen. Mitt Romney.

“Never Trumpers” tried to draft a high-profile Republican like Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan to run against Trump for the GOP nomination. That didn’t pan out either. Facing fairly weak opponents, Trump easily won the GOP primaries that occurred earlier this year. Polls also suggest most Republicans will be strongly behind Trump this November too — he is getting about 90 percent of the Republican vote in head-to-head match-ups with the presumptive Democratic nominee, former Vice President Joe Biden.

But “Never Trumpers” are increasingly involved in the Democratic Party and have gradually shifted their tactics in that direction — effectively becoming a “Never Trump” and “Never Bernie Sanders” coalition. And they appear to be having more success shaping their new party than the one that many of them had been associated with for much of their lives. Here’s how that shift has happened.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-never-trumpers-crashed-the-democratic-party/

The piece goes on to explain, but the four-paragraph rules means you'll have to clink to read the rest of the article. Personally, I find the whole thing depressing: True, Bernie is not and has never been a member of the Democratic Party, but at least he voted the right way 90% of the time.

[EarlG]

1. I'm fine with these Never-Trumpers doing everything in their power to defeat Trump

but we should not be ceding any influence over the direction of Democratic Party to them after this is all over.

Republicans who have turned their backs on Trump should be applauded for doing so, and encouraged to continue their anti-Trump activities. But the Never-Trumpers were proponents of the ideologies that led to Trump in the first place. If they want to be rewarded for turning on him, then their reward should merely be the knowledge that their consciences eventually led them to do the right thing.

If they expect their reward to be that they get to choose the direction of the Democratic Party, they can take a flying fuck off a short pier.

[ancianita]

2. +1,000,000

[Me.]

3. The Thing Is

Do they still believe in the same ideology they always did...conservatism...and are more country club republicans who are revolted by the cruelty, crassness and graft that is Trump? If so, I would welcome their help in getting rid of the WH Menace but feel we would have to be careful of not being pushed to become Republican-lite.

[EarlG]

4. I'm sure they are better than most

otherwise they wouldn't be opposing Trump, and certainly not with so much money and political firepower. So I'm fine cheering on a Lincoln Project ad or a David Frum op-ed trashing Trump.

However, as soon as those ads and op-eds transition from "Defeat Trump" into "Now that's over, let me tell you how the Democratic Party should be doing things" -- that's when they need to be tuned out.

David Frum, Rick Wilson, Steve Schmidt et al have no right to just stroll in from the other side of the aisle and start telling us what to do. Frum wrote George W. Bush's "Axis Of Evil" speech. Wilson helped make the ad that linked Max Cleland to Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. Schmidt gave the world Sarah Palin, the proto-Trump.

Like I said, they should be applauded for taking a stand against Trump. But once he's gone, they should slink off somewhere quiet and have a long hard think about what they did to bring us Trump in the first place.

[Me.]

5. Don't Get Me Wrong

I applaud what they're doing. I've always liked David Frum's writing even if I didn't always agree with his pragmatism. But have to say...I remember Kristol & Schmidt from days gone by when I couldn't bear the former and still wonder how the latter could've led a campaign that featured Palin. I've been gobsmacked to find myself agreeing with them and yes, cheering them on. As they say, politics makes for strange bedfellows.

I especially appreciate wordsmith, fierce, Rick Wilson and George Conway.

Another group I'm also appreciative of is Republicans for the Rule of Law

[CrispyQ]

6. This. So much this:

Like I said, they should be applauded for taking a stand against Trump. But once he's gone, they should slink off somewhere quiet and have a long hard think about what they did to bring us Trump in the first place.

[Midnight Writer]

7. These same never Trumpers would be fine with a President Cruz or a President Rubio.

In a couple of years, these same folks will be running biting ads attacking Democrats.

[SCantiGOP]

8. We teamed up with the USSR to defeat Hitler

Churchill said that if Hitler invaded Hell he would side with Satan.
I feel the same way about the Never Trumpers. If you'll vote with us, welcome and come on it, even if it is just for this one election.
Then I would have no problem with them going back into the republican party to reform it back into the sane party of Ike and Daddy Bush, what they had been before Newt, the neocons and the ex-Confederates turned them into a crypto-fascist and outright racist movement.