Thank you for the correction.
Trump has like a 90%+ approval rating among Republican voters. If they vote against Trump, he tweets shit about them, the voters choose Trump over their senator, approval rate goes down, chance of losing the election goes up.
Quite simple.
What do you think would happen if there were a secret ballot?
I am opposed to a secret ballot because I think each senator should be made to own his/her vote on this or any other issue. But what if…?
I mean, this is the logical option assuming that there is nothing sinister lurking in the background. But, I just don’t get this mentality. Being a Congress person is a job. There are other jobs. I’ve left jobs that were asking me to do things I was uncomfortable with and I didn’t have the cushy landing pad (or the public acclaim for being a hero) that await these guys.
There is no job on Earth worth this.
Yeah, they hacked the RNC too but never released their findings.
There are several reasons I’m sure.
- speaking out against Trump means you lose a primary election
- The GOP probably has a private sector job market for ex politicians. if you speak out against Trump maybe you get blacklisted from the good six/seven figure private sector jobs.
- The base of the GOPs base (a small % of GOP voters) are armed white nationalists who think they work for god, so you may be a target of domestic terrorism
- Putin may have blackmail material on some senators or perhaps their families.
If a senator voted to impeach, there is no upside, only downside. Democrats are not going to vote for him. He could anger Trump fans enough to stay home and not vote. If a significant fraction of his voters do this he loses. Each senator has a different degree of freedom depending on how much of their base are Trump fans but the number who could vote for impeachment and win reelection comfortably could be counted on one hand. Then there are the two thirds who could face a primary contest if they vote for removal.
The number who can’t be primaried and could stand to lose a significant portion of their voters is tiny.
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I was gonna mention the problem with that cushy landing pad, but Wesley beat me to it:
If you stay on the team, you’ve got a great future ahead of you after Congress - right-wing think tanks, lobbying and consulting firms, all of which pay way better than being a U.S. Congressperson.
If your loyalty to the team is questionable, then you lose all that, you lose your Congressional seat in all likelihood, and you’re back to doing whatever you did before you ran for Congress in the first place, or you retire to a retired life that’s OK but way less than all your (now former) buddies from DC are making.
When you get used to inhabiting a perk-laden world, it’s hard to throw all that away.
With a secret ballot, I think Trump is gone.
And per Ravenman and LHoD, it really IS a cult at this point. Look what’s happened to Justin Amash: he had no choice but to leave the party.
It really IS about Trump; it wasn’t like this under Reagan or either Bush. And it’s worse now than it was even just a couple years ago, when McCain, Collins, and Murkowski all voted with the Dems to preserve the ACA: in 2017, it wasn’t entirely Trump’s party yet. Now it is.
There is an upside for those who value things like morality, integrity, decency, and even legacy.
Not true. In fact, petitioning for the June primary in New York for ballot access begins on February 25. Presidential primary petitioning is ending this week. I’m guessing the 31st.
Presidential primary is in April, the rest of the primaries (Congress, State Legislature and local elections) are held in June.
He would easily by acquitted even with a secret ballot. Same reason, Trump goes on a tirade against all politicians. Mike Pence is as charismatic as herpes and loses the next election, GOP prospects and hurt in every race around the country. Maybe you get 55-58, but 67? Not a chance in hell.
I think that would go even better for Trump. It would allow the Republican Senators to vote for acquittal and therefore avoid the downside of having a Republican President removed from office. And then if there was any backlash from the voters about Trump being guilty, they could turn around and falsely claim “Don’t blame me. I was one of the ones who voted guilty.”
To me, it’s looking a bit like an “applause for Stalin” thing. Nobody wants to be the first to stop clapping, because that person is likely to end up the scapegoat, but as soon as one of them does, the others will stop immediately.
Right now, it seems Romney is clapping very very slowly, and I’m sure other Republican Senators are watching him out of the corners of their eyes.
I think one has only to look at John Bolton to see what happens to anyone who deigns to turn their back on the king.
Bolton was once beloved among conservatives. But as soon as he crossed Trump, as soon as he dared suggest that what Trump was doing may not have been on the up-and-up, they turned on him with extreme prejudice, essentially throwing him to the wolves. You have people saying that this guy was a closet-liberal all along, which in the circles he runs in is the equivalent to calling one’s mother a whore.
So, if you’ve spent a lifetime building up a reputation, building up influence within the conservative movement, it’s hard to stomach throwing all that away - and for what? To lash out against a guy who you may find to be personally detestable, but is also pushing policies that you’re largely in agreement with, and that many of your constituents are in agreement with.
And as other people have mentioned, if you piss off Trump’s base, they may not vote Democrat, but there’s a good chance they won’t vote for you either. They’ll just leave that spot on the ballot blank, figuring that it might just be better to let the evil pinko Democrat win this round, rather than vote for a traitor.
On top of that, you’ll also likely find your donor network suddenly tightening their purse strings.
So, even if you do manage to eke out a re-election victory, you’ll be fighting an uphill battle in a race for which you otherwise would have been in a shoo-in.
Anybody who attacks Trump even slightly is automatically scum, moron, sleazebag, etc. He’s been that way his whole life but he was not attacked very much before he ran and took office.
In addition, should any meaningful number of Democratic senators vote to acquit (such as Joe Manchin or even Feinstein, who is still “undecided”, there is then less reason for Republican senators to vote against Trump.
Good example - this is exactly what’s been happening to Bolton over the past few days. (And a few days is all it took - when you’re in a cult, and someone’s outcast, everybody’s opinion of him turns on a dime.) Bolton’s been an arch-conservative for decades, but that didn’t save him. He’s anathema now.
You nailed it. I always agreed with the cult assessment with regard to Trump’s unshakable base. Bolton is a formidable enemy though. I don’t think he’s going to satisfied with just a tell-all book.