An anti-insider, anti-Washington mood has gripped the Republican primary electorate, and with more than a dozen major candidates still vying for the GOP nomination, there doesn’t seem to be much of a reason to look for leadership outside the presidential field. Even so, a few Republican members of Congress loom large over the 2016 contest.
The main one is House Speaker Paul Ryan. Ryan was reluctant to assume the gavel, having already attained the Ways and Means chairmanship he had long coveted. But as the most clear-cut creature of the conservative movement to serve as speaker since Newt Gingrich, and possibly ever, he has a real opportunity to heal the divisions and acrimony that exists among different factions of the Republican Party.
The overarching theme of the Republican campaign so far has been deep rank-and-file distrust of the party’s leaders, to the point where many primary voters have turned to candidates with no governing experience. As the 2012 vice presidential nominee, Ryan had stature comparable to most of the presidential field. He can either help restore confidence in the Republican governing class or drive primary voters into the arms of Donald Trump.
“He’s not off to a good start with the omnibus,” complained one Washington conservative activist, a critic of the controversial, just-completed spending package, calling it an example of what has given rise to Trump. Others are inclined to cut Ryan some slack, saying his predecessor and fractured caucus didn’t give him much room to cut a better deal.
Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., has already left his mark on the Republican presidential race. When Scott Walker, then a front-runner for the nomination, told Glenn Beck the “next president and the next Congress need to make decisions about a legal immigration system that’s based on, first and foremost, on protecting American workers and American wages,” he credited Sessions with the insight.
Walker’s campaign was short-lived, but other candidates with more staying power have been swayed. Trump, who borrowed much of his immigration plan from Sessions’ proposals, appeared with the senator at a rally in Alabama this summer. So did Ted Cruz more recently. Cruz has been sparring with Marco Rubio on legalizing illegal immigrants, but he has moved in Sessions’ direction in two other areas.
“Under no circumstances should legal immigration levels be adjusted upwards so long as work-force participation rates remain below historical averages,” Cruz’s immigration plan states, and H-1B visas cannot be used to displace American workers. Both lines are straight out of Sessions’ playbook.
If Sessions has inspired Cruz to criticize Rubio on immigration, Rep. Justin Amash, R-Mich., has regularly taken to social media to tweak the Floridian from a libertarian perspective. After Rubio failed to vote on the omnibus spending bill, Amash responded to the senator’s tweet promoting campaign calendars by saying, “How about showing up for work today in Congress instead of selling wall calendars?”
That one-liner went viral, but Amash previously had responded to Rubio on permanently extending NSA surveillance powers — the presidential candidate is in favor — with one word: “Disqualified.”
Amash is a Rand Paul supporter, but could emerge as a top critic of the more hawkish members of the field on foreign policy and civil liberties if Paul’s campaign continues to falter. The 35-year-old House Freedom Caucus member already has a history of trouble-making in the halls of Congress. With the right political conditions, he could make mischief on the campaign trail.
No matter how little use grassroots candidates say they have for Washington, the Beltway’s reach into the Republican primaries won’t be limited to the senators still running for president.
