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After the Electoral College voted Joe Biden the 46th president of the United States on Monday night, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell congratulated the 78-year-old on the election victory.
He has previously been reluctant to recognize Biden as the winner of the presidential election. This despite the fact that several close allies of Trump have already turned their backs on him.
The fact that the Senate leader is now congratulating has sparked an open spat in the Republican Party, with supporters of Donald Trump on one side and more moderate Republicans on the other.
– Now we see an internal tug of war about the way forward in the match. Republicans are divided between the pro-Trump nationalist wing and the more traditional Reagan conservatives. The question is how strong the Trump wing will be without Trump in the White House, says researcher Hilmar Mjelde in Norwegian Research Center (NORCE).
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Sacrifice
Donald Trump has claimed since the early November election that he is the real winner and that the election has been stolen. He has repeatedly sued to reverse the election result, without reaching court.
When Mitch McConnell decided to acknowledge the election result, naturally Trump reacted as well.
– Mitch, 75,000,000 votes, record for a sitting president (by a wide margin). It is too early to give up. The Republican Party must learn to fight. People are angry! The president writes on Twitter.
At the same time, he shared an article from the Daily Mail, about the fact that more people are taking a hard line against McConnell.
Trump’s attorney, Lin Wood, calls McConnell a “traitor” and wrote on Twitter that “trial day will come.” McConnell is also called RINO, “a Republican in name only.”
Others who are tough on McConnell include Fox News journalist Mark Levin, QAnon supporter and incoming Congressional Representative Marjorie Greene, and radio host Sebastian Gorka, who has also had a role in the Trump administration.
– will not fail
Mike Flynn recently pardoned McConnell as well, retweeting a post that “it seems we need a few million US PATRIOTS for McConnell to understand that we are not part of his” incoming President Biden “mentality.
He also writes to Trump:
– Millions and millions and millions of patriots are standing behind you, next to you and in front of you at this moment in the history of the United States where our republic is exposed. We will not fail or give in, as someone from the Republican Party has done.
Flynn was a national security adviser in the Trump administration, but was fired after just 24 days in office for lying to the FBI.
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Difficult matches
Despite the harsh words against Mitch McConnell, Hilmar Mjelde denies that there is any crisis in the Republican Party.
– They lost the presidential elections, but obtained better results in the congressional elections. Now they will find a new presidential candidate for 2024, and then there will be tough battles over the ideological course of the party for years to come.
– We must remember that the American parties do not have a single leader, actually. The parties are a coalition of 50 state parties. Additionally, the parties have three separate national chambers for the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the White House. As Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid said in 2009: “I’m not working for Obama.”
Therefore, it could attack
As leader of the Senate, Mitch McConnell is among the most powerful in the United States.
At the same time, a senatorial battle is raging in Georgia. If the Democrats win both senators on January 5, it will be the same in the Senate, and therefore the vote of Vice President Kamala Harris will be the decisive one.
– If Republicans do not retain a majority in the Senate, they will have much less chance of simply blocking Biden’s policy. But in many cases, a majority of 60 senators is needed, the Democrats will lack anyway, explains Mjelde.
Realizing defeat
Fear Trump voters
Many Republicans will also not oppose Trump for fear of losing the support of their constituents. These are, to a greater extent, Trump supporters and not traditional Republican voters.
– The Republican Party is showing incredible cowardice. Party members have been complicit in Trump’s coup attempt because they need their constituents. This just shows that the party is primarily concerned with re-election and has a very short time horizon, Mjelde told Dagbladet before McConnell broke the silence Tuesday afternoon.
This also presents challenges for Joe Biden.
No president in modern times has had a more difficult task than him. The country is so polarized and many Republican voters believe the election has been stolen. Trump’s behavior has led them to an alternate reality. It’s scary and difficult to deal with, Civita adviser Eirik Løkke told Dagbladet on Tuesday.
