Republicans are in trouble. A significant bloc regards their congressional leaders—House speaker John Boehner, Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, and their underlings—as enemies. A quarter or more of grassroots Republicans think Donald Trump should be president. And to make things worse, Hillary Clinton has a glide path to the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016, making her tougher for any Republican to beat.
Paul Ryan’s elevation as speaker, assuming it happens this week, will ease the furor of dissident Republicans. But the differences between them and GOP leaders, including Ryan, have not gone away. When issues like increasing the debt limit and new spending arise, Ryan and the archconservative faction may split angrily.
The contrast with Democrats is striking. They’re united. Senate Democrats have the ability to block GOP initiatives by filibuster, as they did with efforts to defund Planned Parenthood and outlaw sanctuary cities. If a filibuster fails, President Obama is ready to veto almost anything Democrats dislike.
Let’s examine the problems of Republicans one by one, starting with the rebellious faction in the House. It was dismissed as a band of “chuckleheads” when there were only a dozen or so of them. Now there are roughly 40 members of the Freedom Caucus, and they have important allies.
Forty out of 247 House Republicans seems small. But they are impatient and motivated and were willing to use maximum leverage to block Republicans from electing a speaker to succeed Boehner. When they abandoned Boehner on a “motion to vacate” the speaker’s post, he was doomed. The same was true for majority leader Kevin McCarthy when he ran for speaker. Neither had the 218 votes to win.
The loudest complaint of the Freedom Caucus is that GOP leaders haven’t waged war against Obama and have settled for poor compromises with Democrats, such as the budget deal Ryan negotiated in 2013 with Patty Murray, his Democratic counterpart in the Senate.
Their clout is enhanced by support from influential conservative groups. Red State, Heritage Action, Breitbart, the Drudge Report, and much of the conservative talk radio universe are allies, as are prominent conservatives Ann Coulter, Brent Bozell, and Sean Hannity of Fox News. Drudge posted five anti-Ryan links in one day last week, and Bozell gave Ryan a grade of “F” on conservative issues.
The dissidents have a problem with two numbers, 60 and 67. Republicans need 60 votes in the Senate to quash a filibuster. With only 54 Republicans, they need 6 Democrats. On the Iran nuclear deal, 4 Democrats voted with 54 Republicans. The resolution to disapprove the deal died. Despite failing to defund Planned Parenthood, the dissidents continue their effort. But it’s futile. And there’s no possibility of getting the 67 votes needed to override an Obama veto. Still, they argue that keeping alive the issue of Planned Parenthood’s sale of fetal body parts is worthwhile.
Their major disagreement with Ryan and the majority of congressional Republicans is over closing the government. Whatever the issue, whoever prompts the closure, shutdowns are blamed on Republicans. It’s unfair, a product of media bias. Republicans have yet to recover fully from the shutdown in 2013, according to Gallup. Even approval of the GOP by Republicans “is still slightly below the pre-shutdown level,” Gallup found.
The second problem is Donald Trump. He has thrilled many rank and file Republicans. Ron Brownstein of National Journal says the blue-collar, noncollege wing of the Republican primary electorate has “consolidated” around Trump. Chances are, these Republicans won’t cut and run from Trump any time soon, even when he tweets that Iowa Republicans who put Ben Carson ahead of him in a poll last week have “issues in the brain.”
That means Trump, with a solid base, could win the Republican nomination—not likely, but possible. That would probably be a disaster for the Republican party and the candidates for the House and Senate below Trump on the ballot. Trump’s negatives are so high his prospects of beating Clinton in the general election are very poor.
The rule of thumb for 2016 is that Republicans must increase their appeal to immigrant groups and minorities. Mitt Romney got 27 percent of the growing Hispanic electorate in 2012. To win in 2016, the GOP nominee needs roughly 40 percent or more. Trump, having insulted Hispanics, won’t get there. And the notion he would expand the white vote is a myth.
The third problem was caused by Joe Biden. By declining to run, he left the Democratic race firmly in Hillary’s control. Absent Biden, it won’t be a normal campaign in which opponents use the negative information at their disposal to win. Just recall how Romney’s rivals pounded him.
We know Bernie Sanders, Martin O’Malley, and Lincoln Chafee aren’t going to attack her on shoddy ethics and lying, her unsecure emails, and the dubious Clinton Foundation fundraising while she was secretary of state. They backed off meekly in the first Democratic debate.
But Biden might have raised those issues, perhaps noisily, if only because he couldn’t win the nomination without doing so. He’d have had to be Tough Joe, not Nice Joe. But he didn’t have the stomach for it, nor the guts to face down a ferocious pushback by the Hillary brigades. He leaves behind an abnormal primary campaign, with a Teflon frontrunner.
Republicans are likely to experience more suffering. The dissidents have tasted blood in ousting Boehner and blocking McCarthy. Ryan better prepare. Trump? If he begins to fade, he’ll make other Republicans pay for his pain. He’ll blame everyone but himself. And Hillary’s smile won’t look fake anymore.
Fred Barnes is an executive editor at The Weekly Standard.
