[Politics] ‘Trump obsession is very bad’: Senate Republicans confront their problems after poor election showing

[ORIGINje]

 
Donald Trump is facing a flurry of criticism on Capitol Hill, with Republican fury growing over their failure to take back the Senate and GOP leaders at odds over their strategy with the former president still maintaining a dominant hold on the party.

The GOP reckoning comes in the wake of the party leaving another critical Senate seat on the table – Georgia – and seeing Democrats expand their majority to 51-49.

Hours after Trump’s hand-picked candidate, Herschel Walker, failed to pick up a Democratic seat, the blame game began in earnest – in large part directed at the former president. Many argued that the party establishment must take a heavier hand in the 2024 election cycle and root out unelectable Republicans even if they’re backed by Trump. Others said the GOP needs to embrace early voting and wholly reject Trump’s demagoguery of mail-in voting, something that helped power Democratic victories.

And some top Republicans said the party’s refusal to reject Trump as their standard bearer – combined with the 2020 election denialism that is central to his platform – ultimately did them in and will cost them again in future cycles.

“It’s just one more data point in an overwhelming body of data that the Trump obsession is very bad for Republicans, but normal Republicans are doing extremely well,” said retiring GOP Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, whose open seat was picked up by a Democrat.

The Republican soul-searching comes at a critical moment for Trump and the party. Senate GOP leaders are eager to move on from the Trump years and court candidates who have more moderate and mainstream appeal to the suburban voters who left them over their disdain for the former president.

But they are up against a powerful and vocal Trump-aligned faction within their party – especially in the incoming House GOP majority, where a hard-right bloc now holds major sway over GOP leader Kevin McCarthy and his pursuit of the speakership – as they argue the party needs to return to its bedrock conservative principles.

And for Trump, the loss in Georgia is the latest in a growing list of political problems that has caused a new rift within his party and raised major questions about his viability as a 2024 presidential candidate. In the wake of his Mar-a-Lago dinner with prominent antisemites, and subsequent call for the “termination” of the US Constitution, many on Capitol Hill see the loss in Georgia – along with shortfalls in Nevada, Arizona and Pennsylvania – as the final breaking point between him and his party.

Even a staunch ally, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, said Trump needs to convince his party that he can turn things around.

https://edition.cnn.com/2022/12/07/politics/trump-republicans-georgia-senate-race/index.html