Category Archives: Republican

Trump, who has made immigration a top priority of his presidency, plans to push an issue that has long confounded Washington as he runs for reelection over the next nine months. With the impeachment trial behind him, Trump will soon determine whether to push for the bill this year or in a potential second term, according to a White House official.

Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law and senior adviser and the plans architect, has privately expressed confidence that the legislation can eventually move, according to half a dozen people familiar with the situation.

Before you go to battle, you have to do preparation, Kushner said in an interview with POLITICO on Friday. We have done the heavy lifting, the hard prep work. So if the Hill develops an appetite to move forward on an immigration deal, we will be ready. Ultimately, the president will consult with the leadership on the Hill and then decide, do we release the plan now, or do we put it out after the election.

But across Washington, immigration is becoming the new infrastructure week, a punchline used to indicate a subject the Trump administration repeatedly and cheerfully resurrects even when everyone knows it will never amount to any policy change.

A White House official said the bill has already garnered the backing of 22 GOP senators, including Mike Lee of Utah and David Perdue of Georgia, and predicts it will end up receiving support of nearly all 53 Republican senators. But others involved with the negotiations dispute those numbers.

Its a super hard problem, but our job is to try and tackle hard problems, Kushner said. Its easy to say what hasnt been done cant be done, and so often the media declare the presidents agenda items to be impossible like it did with [United StatesMexicoCanada Agreement], the China trade deal, criminal justice reform or building a wall. But time and time again the president proves them wrong.

On Friday, Trump met with members of the Border Patrol Council, a labor group, and praised efforts that have reduced the number of immigrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border. And he made a surprise mention of the legislation in his State of the Union address to Congress last week.

We are working on legislation to replace our outdated and randomized immigration system with one based on merit, welcoming those who follow the rules, contribute to our economy, support themselves financially, and uphold our values, Trump said.

Immigrant advocates say Trump is pushing the issue only so he can point to an immigration plan during his reelection campaign. The Supreme Court is also expected to rule this summer on Trumps decision to wind down the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program that gave work permits and quasi-legal status to foreigners who came to the U.S. illegally as children.

They want to muddy the waters, said an immigration advocate who is familiar with White House conversations with lawmakers and activists. Its all politics.

Trump made cracking down on immigration the centerpiece of his 2016 campaign, calling for a southern border wall and an end to DACA.

But once in office, Trumps immigration moves have been contradictory. His administration has implemented harsh travel restrictions on numerous majority-Muslim nations and cut refugee caps, but he has also touted plans to increase the number of overall immigrants and offer citizenship to those here illegally, a move most Trump-friendly immigration groups oppose. Trump has also surprised his supporters by discussing the need to treat immigrants with heart.

Trump attempted a major rewrite of the nations immigration laws in 2018. The effort quickly died in Congress amid a backlash from immigration hawks, who blasted it for protecting millions of immigrants in the United States illegally.

The updated plan unveiled in May 2019 was significantly scaled back from that first initiative, though some have still dubbed it comprehensive immigration reform. Trump cant accomplish these goals without Congress, the White House official said.

Weve done everything we can by executive order, the official said. Everything we can do unilaterally we have done.

The proposal would admit more high-skilled, well-educated immigrants while reducing the number of people who enter the U.S. based on family ties or whether their native country has a low rate of immigration. It also includes measures to boost security at the borders, including stricter visa screenings at ports of entry and tighter asylum rules, and expand the implementation of E-verify, an electronic system that allows businesses to check work authorization of employees. It would also restructure the Department of Homeland Security and create an immigration czar.

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Trump struggles to win over Republicans on immigration - POLITICO

Political parties dont seem to agree on much these days, but at least 100 members split among Democrats and Republicans do share one common belief Social Security is in dire need of help and they want Congress to do something about it.

The trust funds that support Social Securitys activities are expected to run out of money by 2035, and if that were to happen, beneficiaries would receive about 80% of what theyre owed. Medicare is in even more imminent danger the Medicare Hospital Insurance fund, which supports inpatient care, is expected to be exhausted in 2026.

The Bipartisan Policy Center and the National Academy of Social Insurance released a letter on Tuesday, with 100 signatures from both political parties, addressing this issue, and one way to go about fixing it.

In the letter, Republicans and Democrats call on Congress to act on pending nominations for the public trustee roles for the boards of Social Security and Medicare, which have been vacant since 2015. These roles are supposed to be filled by two people, one Democrat and one Republican, who will work with the boards of Social Security and Medicare to provide guidance for these programs from an independent, nongovernmental perspective.

See: This word describes Social Security but not everyone agrees

The roles were first established in 1983, and their vacancies are violating the intent of federal law and depriving Congress and the public of key objective insights into the health of the [Social Security and Medicare] Trust Funds, the letter says. The last two public trustees terms expired in 2015 under the Obama administration, and Congress has not prioritized filling the positions since, the Bipartisan Policy Center said.

President Trump nominated James Lockhart III, a Republican and a former chief operating officer of the Social Security Administration, and William Dauster, a Democrat and economist who worked on Senate and White House staffs between 1986 and 2017. It is imperative that the vacancies are filled expeditiously to ensure the proper monitoring and safeguarding of the funds that help provide a secure financial foundation for millions of Americans, the letter says. The Senate must confirm the presidents nominations before they can proceed with a four-year term.

Letter signatories include former members of the Trump, Obama, George W. Bush and Clinton administrations, as well as former members of Congress and former Congressional Budget Office directors.

The fact that its signed by prominent folks from both sides of the aisle 100 former public officials equally split saying its urgent to be acted on speaks volumes about the need to get this done even in the midst of a very partisan environment, said Shai Akabas, director of economic policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center.

Legislators and other policy experts have suggested options for fixing the programs funding issues. Some suggest increasing taxes, while others recommend delaying the full retirement age or raising the cap on payroll taxes imposed on high earners. The Democrats have been more vocal about their proposals for Social Security, but still, even during a volatile presidential candidacy campaign trail, Social Security is rarely discussed on the debate stage.

Also see: What would Americans do if faced with a change to Social Security?

Congress has never let Social Security and Medicare fail, experts said, but action should be taken sooner than the anticipated dates of exhaustion for Medicare and Social Security, Akabas said. We really need to work well in advance of that date, Akabas said. Because at that point, a 20% gap of what is taken in and paid out and closing that overnight is next to impossible.

Appointing the public trustee nominees wouldnt necessarily expedite a solution for fixing the current trajectories of these programs, but they would provide an objective viewpoint, and signal to Americans that the programs are being evaluated fairly for their best interests, Akabas said.

The letter comes one day after the Trump administration unveiled its budget proposal for fiscal year 2021, which would trim funding for Medicare, Social Security Disability Insurance and Supplemental Security Income, as well as other programs for older Americans.

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Democrats and Republicans agree on this: Social Security and Medicare need help and soon - MarketWatch

We are products of our times, politically. The ideological intransigence and the complete absence of compromise in the political realm may well result in a foul and disagreeable stalemate.

In 1972, the Democratic primaries spelled apocalypse for the fate of the Democratic Party in their efforts to pitch out one of the least popular GOP presidents, Richard Nixon.

The Democratic National Committee had been floating by endorsement a hack senator from Maine named Edmund Muskie. Nixon was hated by the left, who were galvanized, and Muskie was horrible.

Primary voters who make up a much smaller proportion of the voters who will eventually cast a vote for the party tend to be more ideological than the great unwashed. In the overheated atmosphere of the Vietnam War, Nixon, and a growing culture war, the milquetoast Muskie, and his mainstream heir, Hubert Humphrey, didnt have a chance.

When the dust cleared at the national convention many months later, the Democrats had nominated George McGovern, an anti-war lefty from South Dakota.

The mainstream Democrats abandoned ship, the GOP held firm for Nixon, and McGovern went on to suffer the worst beating any Democrat has ever received in a national contest, losing 49 of 50 states.

The parallels with 2020 are uncanny.

On one hand, if Bernie Sanders wins the nomination, hell nail down the radical left but may stand to lose all or at least a significant part of the center of the Democratic Party. Hes also laughably unlikely to bring over any Republican voters or libertarian-style independents.

On the other hand, should someone emerge from the center Mayor Pete or Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., for example, or Mike Bloomberg, whose campaign will not truly be underway until Super Tuesday the crybaby core of Bernie supporters will probably sulk and whine and then sit on their seedy socialist couches at election time.

Either ugly scenario means defeat for the Democrats, without President Donald Trump doing a single thing differently including being crazy.

So, if Trump wins, the GOP wins, right?

Wrong.

For one thing, barring truly bizarre circumstances, there is almost no room for GOP success in the House. The fragility of the few districts up for grabs plays to Democrats, with rare exception.

At best for the GOP, nothing changes, which means four more years of the same static, harrowing trip of having a Trump presidency which can pass (and fund) policy only with the collaboration of the House Democrats.

But it could also turn worse in a hurry. Trumps recent savage and vengeful victory lap following his impeachment acquittal (coupled with the extremely questionable commentary about interfering in judicial processes), The Washington Post observed, could endanger the reelection chances of five senators in competitive races: Joni Ernst of Iowa, Cory Gardner of Colorado and Martha McSally of Arizona, as well as [Susan] Collins [Maine] and [Thom] Tillis [N.C.].

Which might mean that if the Democrats are able to hold what they have (though they will likely lose Alabama) and turn at least a few of these seats in the competitive races, the real firewall for the GOP in the U.S. Senate goes down in a ghastly inferno, leaving the Democrats with a slender majority in both chambers.

This would mean the Democrats would have the ability to block presidential appointments to the courts, as well as to create anarchy, chaos and despair for any Republican initiatives anywhere else theyd like to.

And after the past three years theyd like to, thanks. Vengeance cuts both ways.

We are products of our times, politically. The ideological intransigence and the complete absence of compromise in the political realm may well result in a foul and disagreeable stalemate.

We will, in William F. Buckleys famous phrase, have a government that governs the least if it governs at all.

There may be an advantage to this: it may give us four more years to change the way we do the countrys business. We are the reason weve come to this.

If its to change, that, too, will be up to us.

R. Bruce Anderson (randerson2@flsouthern.edu) is the Dr. Sarah D. and L. Kirk McKay Jr. Endowed Chair in American History, Government, and Civics at Florida Southern College in Lakeland.

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Anderson: Why the Democrats - and Republicans - are doomed - The Ledger

With Black History Month in full swing and International Womens Day just around the corner in March, conversations centered on the importance of diversity in the workplace are on the rise. Indeed, studies continue to show that companies with more diverse senior leadership teams consistently outperform those with more homogeneous teams. Although there is movement in the right direction with, for example, women occupying an increasingly larger percentage of CEO roles at Fortune 500 companies, there is still much work to be done.

Having fun together

One area of diversity that is less often discussed is one that is also critical in this election year: political diversity. It can sometimes feel like the heated battle between Democrats and Republicans in the United States is only getting hotter. Speakers on one side of the political spectrum continue to be silenced on college campuses by those on the opposite end. What was once healthy disagreement about ideas for how to make the country better has boiled over into vitriol. Surveys conducted over the past 20+ years by the Pew Research Center show that political polarization continues to reach historic levels.

In that case, the last thing in the world one would want would be to place a staunch Republican and an undying Democrat on the same team at work; surely that would be a recipe for disaster. Fortunately, Denise Loyd, formerly of MITs Sloan School of Management and now an Associate Professor of Business Administration at UIUCs Gies College of Business, led a study that tested just this. The authors specifically wanted to see what happens when you tell two peopleone Democrat and one Republicanthat they are about to have a discussion with one another on a topic about which they disagree vehemently. Let the fireworks begin!

But what actually happens is a bit surprising. When Professor Loyd and colleagues ran the experiment in the lab, they actually found that there were many positive effects of such an arrangement. In particular, when a Democrat is told that he or she will meet with a Republican to discuss a problem on which they dont see eye to eye, both parties actually prepare much more carefully for the meetingdigging deeper into the evidence, preparing for more counterarguments, and generally coming to the table more thoroughly prepared. This enhanced preparation, the authors show, actually improves objective decision-making by the partners as well. Diverse groups (juries, in this case) also have been shown to discuss more information, bring up more accurate information, and correct inaccurate information more successfully.

The theorized reason for this improvement in preparation comes down to the mindset with which people enter a meeting or discussion with someone they suspect disagrees with them. Broadly, there are two distinct mindsets with which employees can enter into a work setting: relationship focus or task focus. When focused on relationships, employees have the goal of making friends and building bonds; when focused on tasks, employees instead set their sights on effective task completion. While not always directly at odds with one another (one can indeed have both a high relationship focus as well as a high task focus), people inherently have limited cognitive resources such that an orientation toward a task will naturally come with less proclivity to build relationships, or vice versa.

Friendly relationships with others at work, sometimes even at the expense of the task, are not necessarily a bad thing. Work friends provide social support, which can allow employees to better handle everyday stressors. But friendships also come with risks and costs, one being that when you are meeting with people who are similar to you and with whom you are quite friendly, you may be less inclined to rock the boat by potentially disagreeing with them. When solving difficult problems at work, though, it is imperative that everyonewhether the intern who just started on Monday or the CEO who helped found the companystate their views unambiguously. (McKinsey & Company actually has memorialized this idea in one of its famed values, the obligation to dissent.) In the case of a consulting firm solving a potentially billion dollar problem for its client, the cost of an affiliative mindset can be high, and work teams would do better to put aside their relational concerns and focus on the task, which can be fostered by building diverse teams.

And its just not political diversity either. Although not explicitly tested, Loyd and colleagues theorizing with respect to the benefits of diverse groups extends to any category of diversity, ranging from age or ethnic diversity to less visible diversity on deep-seated attitudes and values. So, although it can feel good to hire people and build teams with those who have similar backgrounds and interests as you, the best bet for your business is to ensure youre truly uncovering the full range of ideas and beliefs about a given topic by building more diverse teams.

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Why Democrats And Republicans May Make The Best Teammates At Work - Forbes

A new video ad by the RepublicanLincoln Project praises the integrity of Army Lt. Col. Alexander Vindmanand criticizes President Donald Trumpfor firing him after he testified in the House impeachment hearings.

Lt. Col Vindman upheld his oath to the Constitution; Donald Trump has not, said a statement by the anti-Trump group announcing the new video, titled Telling the Truth.

Trump, who is afraid of those who know the truth and those who comply with the law, is unleashing a tyrannical assault on Lt. Col. Vindman and highly decorated American patriots and service members who stand tall and speak the truth, said a statement by the group. This is another glaring and sad moment in the Trump presidency that shows why he is unfit to serve as commander-in-chief.

The video includes scenes of Vindman testifying in response to a subpoena from the U.S. House last year. Vindman, who listened to the July 25 call that triggered the impeachment inquiry, called it improper for the president to demand that Ukraine launch an investigation into a political opponent, former Vice PresidentJoe Biden. The call threatened to undermine our Ukraine policy and ... our national security, Vindman testified.

After Trump was acquitted by Senate Republicans in the impeachment trial, Vindman was fired from his National Security Councilpost and escorted from the White House last week. Trump has called Vindman insubordinate for testifying and has suggested that the military should investigate him, which the Army has no intention of doing, said a top official.

What have we become? the video asks at the end.

The Lincoln Project was founded last year by a group of Republicans, including George Conway, husband of White House counsel Kellyanne Conway,to defeat Trumps reelection even if it takes a Democrat.

Our many policy differences with national Democrats remain, but our shared fidelity to the Constitution dictates a common effort, said an op-ed by the group, which also includes GOP media consultant Rick Wilson, and Republican strategists Steve Schmidt and John Weaver.

Another Republican group, Republicans for the Rule of Law, also released an ad attacking Trumps retaliation against Vindman last week.

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'What Have We Become?' New Republican Video Rips Trump Revenge On Lt. Col. Vindman - HuffPost

First-time congressional candidate Randi Reed wants to make history this November as the next Republican Jewish woman elected to Congress. To do so shell have to win a nine-way Republican primary and then a general election in a blue-leaning district. Reed recently spoke to Jewish Insider about her bid to unseat Congressman Steven Horsford (D) in Nevadas 4th district.

Details: Reed is one of two Jewish Republican women running for Congress this election cycle, the other being Lisa Scheller, who is running in Pennsylvanias 7th district against first-term Rep. Susan Wild (D). If Reed wins Nevadas June 9th primary, she will go on to challenge Horsford, who represented the district from 2013-2015 and returned in 2018. The seat has bounced between parties in recent years Horsford, a Democrat, was defeated by Republican Cresent Hardy in the 2014 election; Hardy was unseated after one term. A rematch between the two in 2018 saw Horsford beat Hardy by a 52-44 margin. The district is ranked likely D by the Cook Political Report.

Bio: Reed, 40, grew up in a Conservative Jewish household in a suburb of Los Angeles. She moved to Las Vegas at age 22, where she became involved in the local Chabad community. Over the past two decades, she has worked in the development and construction industry and recently started a small business a custom furniture manufacture out of her garage. She has also served as a volunteer lobbyist in Washington, D.C. on issues related to real estate and taxes.

Why now? In a phone interview with Jewish Insider, Reed said that although she never had anypolitical aspirations, she decided to seek public office after the Tree of Life synagogue massacre in Pittsburgh. I was walking my then five-year-old to shul where we were joining a community vigil for the Pittsburgh shooting victims, and when we turned the corner after parking our car we saw 14 police cars, SWAT units, K9 units, and at that point I had to explain to my five-year-old what antisemitism was while tears were streaming down my cheek, she recalled. It was that moment that I reached out to a friend of mine Stefanie Tuzman, who is the current CEO of the Jewish Federation in Nevada, and I said, I want to do more, I want to be more involved. So I became a board member. And here I am, Im getting really involved.

Foot soldier: Reed, who would join the two serving Jewish Republicans in Congress if elected, argued that there hasnt been enough action from Jewish House members in response to the rise in antisemitism. Either theyre not talking about it, or were talking about it too much, and theres no action. You continue to see article after article written, but no ones doing anything, she said. And being a female in construction development, Ive been successful in building coalitions, Ive been successful in bringing people to the table of all walks of life and finding consensus, and were not seeing that in todays climate at all. Thats something I want to bring.

Women power: According to Reed, her election would send a clear message, specifically in the Republican party, about female equality. Theres over 80 female Democratic congresswomen currently and there are only 15 if you count the territories female Republicans, she tells JI. So looking at that number, you can tell that the Republican Party has struggled a little bit being diverse and being welcome to women.

Sending a message: The fact that you have now specifically two female Jewish congressional women running in the United States to be elected to be able to have a strong voice for Israel, I think that sends a clear message that times are changing, Reed explained. People who care about Israel, whether theyre Jewish or not, understand how important it is to have a strong voice in support of the U.S.-Israel alliance. If Im going to wear that hat, I will gladly wear that hat if that means bringing more awareness.

Holding hands: Reed said she would gladly join forces with Democratic members of Congress to help combat antisemitism. A bipartisan group of House members recently launched the first-ever congressional caucus on relations between the Jewish and African-American communities. I think that were adult enough to go into a room and discuss issues that are related to Israel, to antisemitism, whatever the topic is going to be, and put your differences aside, she said. I like to say, youre either at the table or youre on the menu. And so if you want these people making these decisions for Jews and for Israel, and youre not at the table, then you have no right to complain.

Continued here:

Meet the Candidate She's aiming to be the next Republican Jewish woman in Congress - Jewish Insider

During his usual flurry of Saturday morning Twitter activity, Donald Trump essentially bragged that following his fake acquittal by the GOP-led Senate, he is a king, not a president who can be held accountable.

In a pair of tweets, the president quoted a recent New York Times article which suggested that the results of the impeachment trial partisan acquittal by complicit Republican lawmakers have emboldened Trump.

The Times article Trump was happy to quote on Saturday read more like a warning about the unshackled and emboldened president that Republicans have now created, but Trump appeared to bask in it.

The full passage via The New York Times:

Ralph Waldo Emerson seemed to foresee the lesson of the Senate impeachment trial of President Trump. When you strike at a king, Emerson famously said, you must kill him.

Mr. Trumps foes struck at him but did not take him down.

With the end of the impeachment trial now in sight and acquittal assured, a triumphant Mr. Trump emerges from the biggest test of his presidency emboldened, ready to claim exoneration and take his case of grievance, persecution and resentment to the campaign trail.

MSNBCs Joy Reid blasted Republican lawmakers on her program on Saturday after Trump boasted about his new king status.

Everything Donald Trump has said and done since he was acquitted in the Senate impeachment trial has made Republican lawmakers look like fools.

Many of the GOP senators who voted to acquit did so on the basis of the completely ludicrous idea that Trump had learned a lesson and would conduct government business differently going forward.

Instead, what weve seen is a president who knows he has the Republican Party by the neck and he can conduct himself as a lawless king instead of an accountable president.

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Sean Colarossi currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and was an organizing fellow for both of President Obamas presidential campaigns. He also worked with Planned Parenthood as an Affordable Care Act Outreach Organizer in 2014, helping northeast Ohio residents obtain health insurance coverage.

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Trump Boasts That Republican Lawmakers Have Turned Him Into A King - PoliticusUSA

(Bloomberg Opinion) -- The Senate trial of President Donald Trump is proving less Soviet than expected. Representative Adam Schiff of California, the House impeachment manager, last week presented a coherent, damning and often eloquent narrative of Trumps guilt, backed by text messages, emails, letters and sworn witness testimony previously delivered to the House.

As my colleague Jonathan Bernstein points out, the weight of such facts can alter political gravity. Even Republicans who have made up their minds to acquit which almost certainly describes the entire GOP caucus have had to sit through the avalanche of evidence. Surely it weighs on at least a few consciences. Meanwhile, writes New York magazines Jonathan Chait, ignoring the facts carries risks of its own: The impeachment trial is an exercise in displaying the Republican Partys institutional culpability in Trumps contempt for the rule of law. At some point, they will have to decide to damn the president or to damn themselves.

Its a foregone conclusion: Republican senators will damn themselves to infinity and beyond. The question isnt what Republican senators will decide next week, but where the Republican Party will go after Trumps acquittal. That answer, too, is alarmingly clear: further downward. From 1994 to 2015, give or take, the party was tumbling down a slippery slope. Since 2016, Republicans have been falling at 32 feet per second squared.

Acquitting Trump is not the same as shrugging at the presidents venality and vindictiveness, or mumbling and walking away when a reporter asks whether you believe its OK to solicit foreign sabotage of a U.S. election. Acquitting Trump is a bold, affirmative act.

The acquittal will mark the senators as political made men. It will be their induction into Trumps gangster ethos, using constitutional powers to enable corruption. For those who have hovered on the periphery of Trumps political gangland, there is no route back to innocence.

Many long ago crossed that Rubicon, proclaiming their fealty to the the chosen one. But acquittal will transform even the most reticent Republicans into conspirators against democracy and rule of law.

It will not be long before they are called upon to defend the indefensible again. And they will do it, acquiescing to the next figurative or literal crime just as they did to Trumps videotaped boast of sexual assaults, his horrifying sellouts to Russian President Vladimir Putin, his personal use of charitable contributions intended for veterans, his brutality toward children, or hisquotidian blitzes against decency and democracy.

Schiffs repeated use of the word cheat to describe Trumps posture toward U.S. elections was less an accounting of past performance than a guarantee of future results. No one is really making the argument, Donald Trump would never do such a thing, because of course we know that he would, and of course we know that he did, Schiff told the Senate last week. Hell do it now. Hes done it before. Hell do it for the next several months. Hell do it in the election if hes allowed to.

Whether the game is golf or politics or business, Trump cheats. On trial for seeking foreign interference in the 2020 election, after having been the beneficiary of foreign interference in the 2016 election, Trump will find many willing accomplices before November. His presidency is a strategic boon to multiple U.S. adversaries, most prominently Putin. Another modest investment in Trumps presidency could yield an even larger return destroying, for a generation or more, American democracy not only as a vehicle of ethical government but also as a protector (aspirationallyif not always actually) of human dignity.

This is not cynicism. Its the reality of U.S. politics in 2020. Acquitting Trump will destroy whats left of the Republican Partys claims to ethical legitimacy and pave the way for the further erosion of democracy. The only question that remains is how much more corruption the non-MAGA majority of Americans is willing to take.

To contact the author of this story: Francis Wilkinson at fwilkinson1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Michael Newman at mnewman43@bloomberg.net

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners.

Francis Wilkinson writes editorials on politics and U.S. domestic policy for Bloomberg Opinion. He was executive editor of the Week. He was previously a writer for Rolling Stone, a communications consultant and a political media strategist.

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After Trumps Acquittal, It Will Only Get Worse for Republicans - Yahoo News

Trump was impeached in December for pressuring the Ukrainian government to investigate his political rivals and withholding aid to the country.

Monday will mark the second day for Trumps lawyers to make their opening arguments. They are not expected to use the full 24 hours theyve been given. After those arguments, senators will proceed to a 16-hour question-and-answer period before taking a contentious vote this week on whether to bring in additional witnesses.

Democrats will need at least four Senate Republicans to join them in order to achieve their demands. While GOP Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Mitt Romney of Utah and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska are among the senators who could be open to calling witnesses, Democrats appear less optimistic that they will get the votes they need.

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) declined on Sunday on CBS Face the Nation to forecast whether four Republicans would call for more witnesses, but made clear where he stood.

Im not going to vote to approve witnesses, because the House Democrats have had lots of witnesses, we heard from them over and over and over again this week, Cotton said. We dont need to prolong whats already taken five months of the American peoples time.

One of the House impeachment managers, Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.), also declined on Sunday to predict whether the Senate would have enough votes to bring in additional witnesses.

Im just not going to give up on the Senate and Im not going to draw any conclusions, although I know theres a lot of speculation about what they may do or may not do, Demings said on ABCs This Week with George Stephanopoulos. Im not going to draw any other conclusions.

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Senate Republicans push back on calls for more impeachment witnesses - POLITICO

Todd Kent, 59, of Bryan, brings a deep insight into the transition of the Republican Party from the influence of Ronald Reagan to one fiercely loyal to President Trump. Son of Texas A&M tennis coach and former Brazos County Republican Party chairman David Kent, he has also distinguished himself in higher education. In 2006, he and his family moved to Qatar to support the new Texas A&M campus in the region. There he served as assistant dean for academic affairs and a member of the political science faculty for nine years. More recently he served as top administrator at the University of Utahs Asia campus in Korea. He also has extensive experience as a political consultant. Given Kents recent years in international hot spots, the Trib editorial board spent time focusing on foreign policy. Our broader conversation revealed a pleasant Republican congressional candidate insightful about challenges facing our nation, less so in offering solutions. We did like his immigration assessment from a recent forum in College Station: We need to reform our legal immigration system. The No. 1 criteria ought to be that somebody coming in wants to be an American. Assimilation should be the No. 1 criteria.

QWhy is Todd Kent running for Congress?

AThe big reason Im running is I care about the future were going to leave for our children and grandchildren. I think weve made a lot of progress in the last few years on certain issues, but theres a lot of work to be done. Im a Republican and in 2018 we lost 41 seats [in Congress]. I want to be part of reclaiming the House and helping the Republicans. We need to broaden our base. We need to attract new people. If you look at congressional generic ballot surveys, the only demographic where Republicans beat Democrats is 65-plus. The second reason is we have some big issues, big challenges coming up in the future the national debt, health care, Social Security. We have an aging population. I want to be about helping to solve those problems.

QDonald Trump has been a transformative figure not only for the Republican Party but for the nation. How has he made the Republican Party better if indeed he has?

AThe support youre seeing for Donald Trump right now is tied to the fact that he says and does some things that Republicans have wanted for a long time. He stood up to China for one. Weve talked about it for a long time: We need to stand up to China. And he actually has done that. I think hes taken a slightly different approach to North Korea. The pendulum swings back and forth on North Korea and usually presidents give in, but hes been tougher. I think hes approached the courts in a way that most Republicans like. That is, to appoint conservative judges, meaning they like the Constitution as written. Probably his greatest legacy will be the courts.

QYouve mentioned a couple of things on the diplomatic front. Explain the logic of pulling out of an international pact that everyone, right and left, agrees froze Irans nuclear program at a time when we already had our hands full with North Korea. Now we face two countries pursuing nuclear ambitions. I mean, by the Trump administrations very own acknowledgement, Irans nuclear ambitions had been detained or shelved under the 2015 pact.

APresident Trump said yesterday or the day before that Iran will never have a nuclear weapon.

QSo why tear up the pact? The 2015 pact that Iran was abiding by?

AI think the president believed that, one, it was a bad deal for us and that Iran was continuing to wreak havoc across the world. I think they believe that they continue their efforts in the nuclear realm.

QBut according to the Trump administration, they were not.

AWell, I dont know how to answer that, but I think if you listen to what the president says, he says that, as he encouraged other countries to pull out also, this was a bad deal for the U.S. It hamstrung us. I dont believe that the president believes that Iran would not seek a nuclear weapon. I lived in Korea for four years. Theres similarities and differences between Kim Jong-un and the leaders of Iran, but then again, what they say and what they do are two different things.

QWell, our allies disagree [about Iran over the now broken 2015 nuclear freeze pact], the ones we negotiated with. Now the United States is being touted as breaking its word on an international agreement that we signed.

AWell, I think Trump would say that this was largely just an executive order agreement, that the terms came through Obama. The Senate didnt approve of that. We had a Republican Senate at the time. I think Trump felt like this was his opportunity to right a wrong. I dont have a problem with it. Having lived in the Middle East, I watched the relationships between countries in the Middle East. Since 1979 the Iranians have been at some type of conflict with the United States and a lot of the world. I dont think they can be trusted. I think we need to be in a situation where, like Reagan said, We can trust but verify, and we havent had that opportunity.

QYou spent part of your tenure at a Texas A&M campus in Qatar. Have you gained any insights about the Middle East that would help those of us bewildered by all that is going on, including the struggle between Shia and Sunni sects?

AThats a very good question. I lived there nine years. I interacted with Qataris on the highest level and we had students from all over. They have very long memories. They dont forget anything. Thats why conflicts have been going on for 1,500 or more years. Very tribal. In fact, when I was there and talking to some of the State Department officials, they said, You know, the Qataris want to have local elections but they dont know how to have them where they wont just vote for their tribe. I said, Well, were good at gerrymandering in the U.S. We could work that out for you!

QAnd were getting more tribal [in the United States] all the time.

ASo you see this sense of history there. Some of the [boundary] lines drawn by the British, we see that in Syria and Iraq they dont meet the cultural history, so theres problems. I think with Sunnis and Shias Ill tell you, I worked for George W. Bush, but that was a mistake we made. [This is a reference to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.] We went in there. We got rid of [Sunni strongman] Saddam Hussein. I dont think anybody realized that 60% of the people [in Iraq] were Shia, so immediately the country leaned towards Iran and were still paying the price for that. I think we as Americans would do better if we understood that this region is not a monolith like other countries. I mean, its very different. Most countries you go into, theres so many tribes, theres an extensive history. Even Iraq, youve got the Sunni, the Shia and the Kurdish people and they all have different ways of looking at things.

QHave we effectively screwed the Kurds again?

AI hope not. Theyve been a very good partner for us and theyve been loyal to us. I hope that the end gain will be no. I think to go to the Kurdish area right now in Iraq, theres good things happening. Theres economic development and that kind of stuff. But its always tricky there because its contingent on other factors, so I worry about them. I worry about Turkey messing with the Kurds not only in their own country but spilling over into [Kurdish areas in] Iraq.

QShould Turkey be in NATO anymore?

ANATO, this mutual defense pact that NATO talks about that will come to the rescue of everything, it seems to me theres some possible contradictions with Turkey in the mix. They have different goals. Weve seen that in Iraq. Weve seen that in Syria. Probably things wouldve been different in Iraq if Turkey wouldve let us use their bases, but they didnt. My wife works with Syrian refugees in Lebanon and a lot of them fled because Turkey and the proxies from those countries made it very difficult for them to live there.

QYou also spent time in South Korea. I believe on the phone you mentioned to me that you were just 30 miles from the North Korean border.

You mentioned that people are pretty unworried in that area about the North. Give me insights as to why they seem confident things will work out.

AI think its because in their history its always been that way. Thats what the students would tell me. Even the adults would say, Its always been this way. It ebbs and flows so we dont see anything different. As a leader of a university over there, what I would do is watch the U.S. army base. If they went on alert, then we would get nervous. But even though the rhetoric was loud, you didnt see a real change. You know whats interesting, its the same thing in the Middle East.

QYouve also taught political science. You mentioned a problem that Republicans dont seem to be growing beyond older, white people. Texas House Speaker Dennis Bonnen last year rather infamously noted that President Trump was losing Republican support in the Texas suburbs because of his impulsive ways and things he says at rallies and in tweets. Given there is this fidelity to the president in party ranks, what is the Republican Party to do? Thats not a long-term prescription for [a viable political party].

ANo, its not, especially losing females. I think sometimes the presidents strong rhetoric turns off female voters. But I think its even bigger than that. I think were the party of individual liberty, limited government, growth, business. I think that we have got to do a better job of expanding those ideas into the next generation.

QNo one questions that, but Republicans are so busy playing to their [far-right] base that they cant appeal to the suburbs. I mean, what issues do Republicans need to take a second look at?

AIn College Station, I talk to students all the time and I ask them what are the big issues? They say, Debt. I say, The national debt? And they say, Well, student debt. But I think in a lot of ways students care about the same things that we do I mean, older people. I think in this state demographics are showing more and more Hispanic voters. Youve seen the valley and then you have the suburbs and the rural areas and then cities. Theres three distinct voting blocs now in the Statehouse. I want to be part of the effort to reach out and do a better job, that we replace these 65-plus voters with some younger people.

QLet me put it this way. I grew up in the Republican Party. I was in the Republican Party longer than anybody in this room and I dont recognize this party anymore. What issues does the Republican Party need to take a look at? I ask because I know your father was a well-known Republican Party chairman.

AThe problem with Central Texas is we tend to be a little bit in a bubble. Were a fairly homogeneous population. Everything is fine here. Everybody is a Republican. Thats kind of the idea, especially Brazos County. Lets take Hispanic voters. They tend to be hard-working, pro-family. I would say a majority are pro-life. A lot of them are Catholic and tend to be pro-life. Well, these are typical Republican issues. We just havent done a good job of going and meeting them where theyre at. And I think one reason is we talk about border security and sometimes they see that as an affront to them.

QWell, look at President Trumps remark about a [Hispanic] federal judge he labeled as Mexican and thus unable to judge Trump fairly on an issue of importance to Trump.

AWe have to look at our language. We have to look at our efforts. And you know, weve been talking about this in the Republican Party for years, but the problem with politics is you tend to go from cycle to cycle. By the time we finish this cycle, well start another one. Whos going to do the outreach effort? You know what I mean? But I think, as a Republican in this country today, we have to get better or were going to lose out.

QDo you equate getting better with changing?

AThe Republican Party, in my lifetime, we used to be all Democrats. And now weve been Republicans for the last, what, 30 years. The issues were fiscal conservatism and conservative social issues. Pro-life, pro-family type issues, and that was important. And I think what youre seeing is some splintering.

QLike a trillion-dollar deficit?

ATrillion-dollar deficit? Yeah, where theres equal blame to go around .

QBut the Republican Party is supposed to be better about fiscal issues. Republicans ran the White House, House of Representatives, Senate, and the primary accomplishment during that two-year period was the 2017 Tax Cut & Jobs Act. It cut the revenue growth we anticipated and we increased spending. Make sense of this.

AIf you look at the 2018 budget, we took in $3.5 trillion. We ought to be able to run a country on $3.5 trillion dollars. Thats my opinion. We spent $4.1 trillion. Now, part of that is just wasteful spending. But a big component is in health care. Medicare and Medicaid together are about 28 percent. These increases are built in, meaning they are entitlements. If youre over 65, youre eligible for Medicare. And so more 65-year-olds, more money is going to go out. The problem is, we havent said, OK, these are entitlements, but we need to get our administrative costs under wraps. You talk to health-care experts, they say at least 50% of our administrative costs are excess. Theres too much money going out. The New York Times reported the average angioplasty in the United States is $32,000. Across the world its $6,400. Were not able to keep our costs under control. Defense budget is 50 percent of our discretionary spending. Now, I support the defense, but theres wasteful money. We need to have a handle on it. We lose $100 billion, dont know where it went! As a government, we really need to get our hands around these things. We have to make some hard decisions. Weve made promises to people and we have to figure out how to honor that, yet make things work. And I think in this last Congress, nothing got done. There may have been an impeachment, but hardly any policy work is getting done. Nobody wants to talk about these things. Theres not a Democrat or a Republican who wants to talk about reducing entitlements.

Interview conducted by Trib editor Steve Boggs and opinion editor Bill Whitaker. It has been condensed for space and edited for clarity.

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Managing an unruly world far and near: Q&A with Republican congressional candidate Todd Kent - Waco Tribune-Herald