Top House conservative plots post-Trump GOP

The leader of an influential House conservative caucus is charting a future for the GOP that deemphasizes President Trump but marries his populist agenda with traditional conservatism, a hybrid Republicanism he believes can win national elections.

“The Trump agenda was what was popular — not Trump the man,” Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana, incoming chairman of the Republican Study Committee, told the Washington Examiner in an interview. “As it appears more and more likely that Trump will not be in the White House and we will begin the post-Trump era, our party has to begin a conversation of what we look like moving forward. No one is having that conversation. I want to lead it.”