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Trump’s strength excited some Republicans, others fear, but no one dared tell him it was time to admit defeat.
Since President Donald Trump was elected in 2016, his relationship with Republican MPs on Capitol Hill has largely fallen into two categories: one of his most fervent people, his support at all costs, on the other side are those who share his schedule with him, but quietly skeptical of Trump’s style and strategy.
President Trump speaks during a press conference in the East Wing, the White House, early November 4. Image: AP
Neither of these groups now feel that it is their responsibility to convince Trump, who refuses to admit that he lost the race for the White House to his Democratic rival Joe Biden, that he must accept the result, or at least. it is to stop transmitting messages that call into question the integrity of the election. On the other hand, there is also little chance that President Trump will listen if he does.
This fact helps explain why, days after the media named Joe Biden president-elect, even Republican Senator Mitch McConnell, who leads the majority in the Senate, is still not ready to acknowledge the conclusion. Fruit.
Instead, they appear to be trying to “close their eyes” to the fact that Trump has lost and that his campaign does not have enough credible evidence of large-scale electoral fraud to reverse the results. .
Trump’s legal campaign is filing lawsuits in five battlefield states, including Pennsylvania, Nevada, Michigan, Georgia and Arizona. In Arizona, Biden is ahead of Trump with more than 20,000 votes. In Georgia, Trump is less than 14,000 votes behind his opponent, while the difference in Pennsylvania is more than 47,000 votes in favor of Biden.
Trump’s attorneys have filed a few hundred abnormal voting cases in state courts. Even if they win these lawsuits, it is almost impossible for them to change the election results, due to the large gap between the two candidates.
On November 10, a group of Republican senators openly at odds with Trump, including Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, admitted Biden’s victory.
In the past, MPs could go to the White House to speak directly to the president about the actual political situation. Instead, Vice President Mike Pence went on November 10 to the Capitol, where he continued to spread allegations of President Trump’s election fraud. During the luncheon with Republican senators, Pence announced that he and the president would continue to fight the election result until the end, detailing the legal action they would take.
McConnell later refused to acknowledge Biden’s victory. “We will pass this phase and we will be the winners in January, like four years ago,” he told reporters.
Rather than trying to sway the president’s thinking, most Republicans try to avoid giving advice on what Trump should do.
In a statement on Nov. 10, Ohio Republican Senator Rob Portman refused to acknowledge Biden’s victory, asserting that President Trump had full authority to demand that “every legitimate vote be counted.” .
However, he also added that “the Trump election campaign must provide evidence of any allegation of election fraud.” This is a sign of how wary Republicans are in the face of the president’s accusations.
But on the other hand, some loyal members of the Trump party hastily support the claims of his election fraud, although there is no evidence. Senator Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue of Georgia asked their state’s top election official, a Republican, to resign, after he said there was no evidence of voter fraud in Georgia.
When asked by a reporter if he was congratulating Biden on his victory, Wisconsin Republican Senator Ron Johnson replied that “nothing is worth celebrating.”
In 1974, when President Nixon faced the Watergate scandal and a high possibility of impeachment, a group of powerful Republican congressmen went to the White House, and in turn named the members of his party who would vote. he condemned him, telling Nixon it was time to go. His message was clear and President Nixon resigned the next day.
However, this scenario is unlikely to happen to Trump, said Timothy Naftali, founding director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, a professor at New York University.
“It is very difficult for Republicans to turn their backs on their leader, who received 71 million popular votes, the highest number in history,” Naftali said. “If you were a Republican and made the wrong decision at this time, you will be disqualified.”
Still, some Republicans in recent days have started arguing that party members must be held accountable for fighting the president’s unfounded statements about voter fraud.
On November 9, 31 former Republican congressmen, many of whom were openly critical of Trump, dismissed the president’s allegations in an open letter urging him to accept the conclusion. election results.
“We believe that President Trump’s statements accusing electoral fraud are an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of the elections and are unacceptable,” the letter said. “Every vote must be counted and the final result must be accepted by the participants because the public’s faith in the electoral results is the foundation of our democracy.”
Barbara Comstock, a former Republican MP from Virginia who signed the letter, said she did so because skeptical voters “need to understand and see that it is not true.”
According to Comstock, his former colleagues have quietly concluded that Trump’s legal challenges “are going nowhere.”
Vu hoang (According to the The Times of New York City)
