Paul Ryan’s refusal to support Trump, while telling other GOP House members “you all need to do what’s best for you and your district,” is tantamount to officially telling House members to choose sides in an all out civil war within the Republican party. Meanwhile, according to Bloomberg, Ryan’s spokeswoman AshLee Strong, basically conceded the presidential race saying that “the speaker is going to spend the next month focused entirely on protecting our congressional majorities”…something we suspect will be no easy task after taking steps that will most certainly fracture the Republican voter base.
Meanwhile, Trump has launched counter attacks against Ryan saying he “should spend more time on balancing the budget, jobs and illegal immigration and not waste time on fighting Republican nominee.”
Paul Ryan should spend more time on balancing the budget, jobs and illegal immigration and not waste his time on fighting Republican nominee
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 10, 2016
Despite winning the second debate in a landslide (every poll), it is hard to do well when Paul Ryan and others give zero support!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 11, 2016
Our very weak and ineffective leader, Paul Ryan, had a bad conference call where his members went wild at his disloyalty.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 11, 2016
As the Wall Street Journal pointed out, Ryan’s announcement to the Republican leadership drew a lot of criticism from people within his own party, many of whom are likely worried about losing their jobs in November as a result of the decision.
“There was certainly division and different opinions about what should happen,” on the call, said Rep. Bill Huizenga (R., Mich.), who has stuck to his position that he would vote for Mr. Trump but criticize him when he feels necessary. “The consensus was, look, anybody who might have some sort of notion that we should somehow switch candidates or that we could—that just isn’t realistic.”
“This isn’t rocket science—the better Donald Trump does, the better our party does,” one Republican lawmaker told Mr. Ryan on the call.
Meanwhile, Newt Gingrich pointed out the utter fallacy of Ryan’s position by saying that, from a practical standpoint, there is no alternative to Trump.
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a top Trump adviser, had a veiled warning for Ryan in a Facebook Live session Monday afternoon, saying, “I would hope that every Republican leader, so-called Republican leader, would look seriously at what they are doing an saying now.”
“If you can communicate to your voters that Hillary Clinton is totally unacceptable and why she is unacceptable, you don’t have to run around and defend Donald Trump,” he said. “That’s Donald Trump’s job. But you don’t have to abandon him — because there is no alternative at a practical level.”
Rumors have even swirled that Mike Pence was seeking to distance himself from Trump which he attempted to squash at his first public appearance since the debate. Per the Washington Post:
Pence made his first campaign appearance since news of the videotape had broken, telling a group in Charlotte on Monday that it had been “an interesting few days.” He lauded Trump for apologizing during the debate for his vulgar remarks about forcing himself on women in 2005.
“It takes a big man to know when he’s wrong and admit it,” said Pence, adding, “Donald Trump last night showed that he’s a big man.”
“My hope is that people across the country, including elected officials, believe in redemption as much as I do,” he said. “I’m happy to talk to any of my friends in leadership. But really, this election is really in the hands of the American people.”
Meanwhile, not everyone within the Trump camp seemed to be standing strong for their candidate as the generally well-spoken Kellyanne Conway seemed to stumble in affirming her support in the following MSNBC clip.
Meanwhile, per Bloomberg, polls show two-thirds of Republican voters are still standing with Trump despite his vulgar comments about women, putting Ryan and other Trump defectors at odds with the mainstream of the party.
At this point, we suspect that no matter who “wins” this internal struggle between Trump and the establishment candidates, the Republican party, as it is currently known, is already dead. To some extent, that, in and of itself, means that Trump has already won as the whole point of his candidacy and basis of his support was a complete disruption of establishment control of Washington…on both sides of the aisle…which is something that establishment Republicans have failed to understand from the very start of this election cycle.
via http://ift.tt/2d9IgwP Tyler Durden