You can always count on Republicans to shoot themselves in the dick.
GOP voters should not have to wait around and guess whether Republican senators will support the appointees of a Republican president.
Friday’s Senate confirmation of Pete Hegseth to lead the Pentagon was a major win for those hopeful that a second Trump administration will bring transformational change to the federal government. But the uncertainty over whether the Senate GOP would approve his nomination inadvertently shined a light on a glaring problem with the Republican Party.
Until the moment Vice President J.D. Vance cast the tie-breaking vote in his favor, it was virtually unknown whether Hegseth had the votes necessary to become America’s next secretary of defense. The Wall Street Journal reported that Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C. — who previously pledged to support Hegseth and President Donald Trump’s other nominees — was seemingly getting cold feet on voting to confirm the Army veteran ahead of Friday night’s confirmation vote.
With all Democrats expected to vote in opposition, Hegseth could only afford to lose three GOP votes. At that point, Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, had already announced their respective intent to oppose Hegseth, and Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., had given no indication of which way he would vote.
Assuming McConnell sided with Collins and Murkowski, a “no” vote from Tillis would have sunk Hegseth’s confirmation.
While the North Carolina Republican ultimately made the right choice by supporting Hegseth, the entire spectacle raises a significant question: Why was the success of Hegseth’s confirmation in question to begin with?
What Republican voters have seen play out with transformational picks like Hegseth has been anything but the “advice and consent” role delegated to the Senate and its members. Rather, it’s been a display of the GOP establishment’s willingness to sabotage these Trump appointees before the upper chamber votes on their nominations.
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It’s fine for GOP senators to ask legitimate questions of any prospective appointee and his or her views. That’s especially true when those nominees hold policy positions that go against a conservative worldview, such as Kennedy’s previously espoused support for abortion.
But the deliberate efforts by some Republican senators to subvert these picks have nothing to do with their commitment to conservatism or Trump’s vision and everything to do with the threat the nominees pose to the D.C. status quo.
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GOP voters should not have to wait around and guess whether Republican senators — especially those from “red” states who voted for many of Joe Biden’s radical nominees — will be supporting the appointees of a Republican president. The fact that they do is an indictment of the pathetic state of the Republican Party, whose members conservatives can always count on to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Why are these people still in office? Don't answer that. I'm pretty sure I know why.
It is well past time to make RINOs an endangered species.
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