EXCLUSIVE: How Establishment GOP Plans to Turn on Evangelicals
In the middle of June 2015, Donald Trump announced his candidacy for president of the United States of America. Over the next 12 months, candidate Trump threw a monkey wrench into the early coronation of yet another establishment moderate—candidates in the mold of “McCain 2008” and “Romney 2012.”
Thank God. Otherwise, TV network executives would have elected Hillary Clinton in 2016 and America would be barreling toward the falls of Niagara and the loss of religious liberty and freedom.
Although the battle for the soul of the Republican Party began much earlier than 2015, it is beginning to come into sight that moderate, establishment Republicans are trying put a lid on Donald Trump and the American people’s grassroots, precinct-level revolt. Aren’t these the same ones who called for a purge of Donald Trump and his followers from the Republican Party in 2015?
Establishment moderates love to champion the idea of the “Big Tent GOP,” as long as they control the tent.
House Speaker Paul Ryan’s attempt to pass a bill dubbed “Obamacare Lite”—a bill polling showed 83 percent of the nation opposed—provoked Newt Gingrich to Tweet: “Why would you schedule a vote on a bill that is at 17% approval? Have we forgotten everything Reagan taught us?” President Reagan prioritized his legislative agenda battles, endeavoring to move legislation that had a 70 percent approval rating.
The jury is still out on the current Republican leadership. Too many politicians run as conservatives in order to be elected but then govern as mushy, establishment moderates.
Gingrich is right. Have we forgotten everything Reagan taught us? President Reagan won re-election in 1984—with 49 states—by running on principle and moral absolutes. Painting with bold colors, Reagan said, “Our people look for a cause to believe in. Is it a third party we need, or is it a new and revitalized second party, raising a banner of no pale pastels, but bold colors which make it unmistakably clear where we stand on all of the issues troubling the people?”
For crying out loud, Republicans have now lost the popular vote in the last six of seven presidential elections. But the recent setback by Republican leadership telegraphs that establishment moderates have still not learned the lessons from the McCain and Romney campaigns. The lesson? Grassroots, precinct-level evangelical and pro-Life Catholic Christians have had enough of the top-down, my-way-or-the-highway approach.
Apparently, Ryan will follow the Denny Hastert/John Boehner model that resulted in failure after failure for the last 18 years. Former Minority Leader Boehner told us in 2010 that if given control of the House (and Leader McConnell said the same thing of the Senate in 2014), he would storm the gates of hell with a water pistol. But nothing happened. Nada, zilch and zero.
These establishment-type Republicans write a liberal bill and then wrestle with conservatives for a while before offering them scraps from the table. Then, when conservatives decline to support the crummy bill (and the bill goes down in defeat) they blame conservatives. That is exactly what we have witnessed in the battle between the Freedom Caucus and Ryan’s healthcare bill.
And GOP leaders repeat this process for every major bill, taking their cue from the backside of a shampoo bottle: “Rinse. Lather. Repeat.” It’s the same leadership, same process, and same result—ever since Gingrich resigned as Speaker in 1998.
I would wager that most of the RNC establishment moderate chieftains and lieutenants (i.e., the main beneficiaries of the 15 percent Agency Fees from radio and television buys, direct mail and polling) didn’t vote for Donald Trump in 2016. It’s mind-boggling that they are still in charge of the GOP bureaucracy and structure.
Here’s what is clear. Since last November, establishment Republicans have dismantled the transmission agent that produced, according to ABC News, “The largest turnout of evangelical vote in history.”
What will be the ramifications?
President Trump will spend an enormous amount of time and energy over the next four years raising between $750 million to $1 billion dollars that he will pour into the RNC, NRSC and NRCC coffers. The profit from the TV and radio agency fees, fundraising, direct mail, telemarketing and polling contracts will be distributed mainly among those who did not support, nor vote, for Mr. Trump.
In return, they will leak information and undermine him at every turn over the next three years. This will likely give Democrats control of the House and Senate in the 2018 midterms. And when that happens, the establishment will blame evangelical and pro-life Catholic Christians for staying home on November 6, 2018.
President Trump will rue the day he left the Bush, McCain and Romney chieftains and lieutenants in charge of the Republican Party apparatus. Trust me. {eoa}
