The three most important Republicans in Washington have each in their own way signaled qualms about their Capitol Hill majorities.
House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., is the latest with his announcement that he is not seeking re-election. While family was a major motivating factor in Ryan’s decision, it was a not a vote of confidence in his party’s ability to retain him the speaker’s gavel — and the timing was not conducive to Republicans’ 2018 midterm electoral fortunes.
“I really do not believe whether I stay or go in 2018 is going to affect a person’s individual race for Congress,” Ryan told reporters. But many Republican insiders disagree. “How do you convince wavering members to run again after this?” asked one strategist. “Convince wavering donors to give money again?”
Republicans will be losing one of their most effective fundraising weapons in Ryan himself — the money hauls will still come in, but as a lame-duck speaker, they are likely to be diminished. And Rep. Dennis Ross, R-Fla., announced his retirement right after Ryan did.
Ryan’s decision was not made in a vacuum. Just before his announcement, the super PAC affiliated with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., released a memo reiterating that the party faced the worst political environment since 2006 — when Democrats captured both houses of Congress, capitalizing on an unpopular president and war — and resources should be devoted to protecting the Senate, despite a map in which Democratic incumbents are seeking re-election in ten states won by President Trump.
“Late last year we wrote: ‘Republicans can expect to face the toughest political conditions next year since 2006, when the party lost control of both the House and the Senate.’ Despite a small uptick in President Trump’s approval rating and a tightening of the congressional generic ballot in the GOP’s favor, we see no reason to adjust that forecast,” Senate Leadership Fund executive director Steven Law wrote in the “Senate Investment Forecast Spring 2018 Update.”
The memo was far from a white flag.
“We are cautiously optimistic about holding our defensive positions in Arizona, Nevada and Tennessee,” he wrote. “On the offensive side, we are already active in all of our top-tier Senate pick-up races: Florida, Indiana, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota and West Virginia.”
But it does reflect at least a little unease within McConnell’s world. “You have to think they are speaking for the leader,” said a Republican strategist. Indeed, a former McConnell chief of staff has expressed public concerns about the majority.
“You’ve got to accept that [a Democratic Senate majority] is possible. Up until now, most Republicans have said the House is going to be a challenge, but the Senate map looks pretty good in our favor. But there are now a lot of combinations you could use to lose the Senate,” Josh Holmes told National Journal. “There’s the issue of Democratic enthusiasm and Republicans’ complacency: Democrats are bathing in cash at every level, and Republicans are really working hard to raise a fraction of that.”
President Trump is also behaving as if he is unsure he can count on Republican congressional majorities. While he continues to tout their biggest shared accomplishment, tax reform, he has shifted the focus to trade and immigration. After a year of working together, however fitfully, on the shared Republican agenda, Trump has reverted in 2018 to many of the populist and nationalist themes he campaigned on to win the presidency.
For down-ballot Republicans, this is a decidedly mixed bag. It’s not good for GOP lawmakers representing suburban districts, who are most vulnerable because of the “resistance” among college-educated and affluent voters. It does, however, seem likely to limit Democratic pickup opportunities in more blue-collar areas, forcing them to run the table in the suburbs.
Of course, Democrats could indeed maximize those chances on the way to a House majority, at the same time Trump tries to at least partially reclaim his independent brand.
It’s going to be very interesting to see how he deals with a [Nancy] Pelosi-led House,” said a Republican strategist. “He’ll have to start making deals with her and Chuck [Schumer], which is going to make his base even more insane.”
