My vision is to run with support from the president [Trump] and his coalition of voters, which was the highest number of votes ever won by a Republican nominee, Stefanik reportedly told Bannon on his War Room podcast on Thursday.
“This is also about being one team. And I’m committed to being a voice and sending a clear message that we are one team, and that means working with the president and working with all of our excellent Republican members of Congress.”
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Stefanik has emerged as the likely successor to Rep. Liz Cheney
Cheney has come under criticism from former President Trump
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Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) will likely be voted off the House Republican Leadership. Her crime: acknowledging the reality that Trump lost the election. The Republican Party is no longer a conservative party. It is an anti-democratic cult pushing the Big Lie and conspiracy theories. Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) May 6, 2021
Cheney is going through a public rift with her party after being one of the few Republicans to show criticism toward Trump. Cheney has repeatedly gone after the former president over his various remarks arguing the election was stolen from him.
Trump lost the election to Biden and there has been no evidence of widespread fraud, despite his repeated protests.
Trump more than three months out of office remains the dominant force within GOP politics and is willing to try to sink fellow Republicans heading into 2022.
That’s left Republicans divided into largely three camps: Flatter Trump, try to ignore Trump or, increasingly rarely, fight Trump, none of which unite a fractured party.
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Cheney’s embrace of the third option is not only highlighting her odd-woman-out status on Capitol Hill, but putting renewed focus on those larger divisions.
“There is an overwhelming need to please Trump … and yet that is felt more in the House than in the Senate,” said Doug Heye, a GOP strategist and former House leadership aide, about the differences in strategy. “That’s a big part of it.”
Luntz noted in an interview on the New York Times podcast “Sway” released Thursday that “more than two-thirds of Republicans believe that the election was stolen,” warning that a widespread and unproven belief that there was rampant fraud last November could turn Republicans off from voting in the midterm elections.
“What Donald Trump is saying is actually telling people it s not worth it to vote. Donald Trump single-handedly may cause people not to vote. And he may be the greatest tool in the Democrats arsenal to keep control of the House and Senate in 2022,” Luntz said.
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The pollster also said that Trump would be the odds-on favorite to win the Republican nomination if he runs again in 2024.
I m focused entirely on the present and the future not the past. . My view at the moment is we need to turn this administration into a moderate administration, McConnell told reporters at a stop in Kentucky, asked if Trump s criticism was a distraction from the infrastructure debate.
Asked at a second event on Thursday about Trump s criticism of him and Rep. Liz Cheney
ADVERTISEMENT What I m focusing on in this new administration. I m looking forward not backward and unifying my troops in the Senate around reacting to where we are today and going forward, McConnell said.
The back-to-back questions underscore how even though the Senate is out of town for the week, and McConnell is using the stops to talk up his opposition to the Biden administration s $4 trillion spending plan, he hasn t been able to escape the long shadow of Trump and the GOP s infighting.