The Hill: RINO Senators Fear "Radical Conservative Populism"

Breaking news, liberals hate and fear conservatives.

Republican senators say they're worried that conservative populism, though always a part of the GOP, is beginning to take over the party, becoming more radical and threatening to cause them significant political problems heading into the 2024 election.

GOP senators are saying they're being increasingly confronted by constituents who buy into discredited conspiracy theories such as the claim that Democrats stole the 2020 presidential election or that federal agents incited the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Growing distrust with government institutions, from the FBI, CIA and Department of Justice to the Centers for Disease Control and National Institutes of Health, make it more difficult for Republican lawmakers to govern.

So we should just trust them, to make it easier for you to control us?

Any chance you'll force them to reform, so that they'll be worthy of trust? Or is the onus on us just to force ourselves to forget their crimes?

It's on us, right?

Republican senators believe their party has a good chance to take back control of the White House and Senate, given President Biden's low approval ratings and the favorable map of Senate seats up for reelection, but they regularly face political headaches caused by populist members of their party who say the rest of the GOP is out of step with mainstream America.

I wonder why they got to attack conservatives.

"We should be concerned about this as Republicans. I'm having more 'rational Republicans' coming up to me and saying, 'I just don't know how long I can stay in this party,'" said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). "Now our party is becoming known as a group of kind of extremist, populist over-the-top [people] where no one is taking us seriously anymore.

Mitch's Bitch Lisa Murkowski. Of course.

"You have people who felt some allegiance to the party that are now really questioning, 'Why am I [in the party?]" she added. "I think it's going to get even more interesting as we move closer to the elections and we start going through some of these primary debates.

"Is it going to be a situation of who can be more outlandish than the other?" she asked.

Some Senate Republicans worry the populist winds are downgrading their chances of picking up seats in 2024.

"There are an astonishing number of people in my state who believe the election was stolen," said one Republican senator who requested anonymity to talk about the growing popularity of conservative conspiracy theories at home.

...

A second Republican senator who spoke with The Hill said the growing strength of radical populism "makes it a lot more difficult to govern, it makes it difficult to talk to constituents."

"There are people who surprise me -- I'm surprised they have those views. It's amazing to me the number of people, the kind of people who think the election was stolen," the lawmaker said. "I don't want to use this word but it's not just a 'red-neck' thing. It's people in business, the president of a bank, a doctor."

The lawmaker, who requested anonymity to discuss the political challenge posted by surging conservative populism, accused some fellow Republicans of trying to exploit voter discontent to gain local or national prominence.

"In my state there are a lot of folks who see Washington as disconnected, they see their way of life threatened. There's something that generates discontent that elected officials take advantage of," the senator said.

I wonder who these cowards are, who refuse to sign their names to their attacks on conservatives.

Allow me to take a guess: Cuck liberal Senator Tom Tillis, recently censured by his own North Carolina Republican Party for taking leftwing positions.

Conservative delegates to the annual North Carolina Republican Party convention voted Saturday to censure the state's senior U.S. senator, a member of their own party, for votes that delegates said went against the party's views on key issues.

U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis, a Republican who has served in Congress since 2015, has attempted in recent years to work on bipartisan deals in Congress on hot-button issues -- particularly guns, immigration and gay marriage -- which have left some conservatives feeling dissatisfied with his record. The official resolution against Tillis is vague, saying he is being censured for "blatant violations of our party platform."

A Tillis spokesman said Saturday after the vote that the senator "keeps his promises and delivers results," and former Republican Gov. Pat McCrory also jumped to Tillis' defense, tweeting that he hoped all the state's elected officials would stand behind the senator.

But that wasn't happening Saturday at the convention.

State Rep. Mark Brody, R-Union, supports the censure. He told WRAL that the dissatisfaction started building several years ago, when Tillis initially opposed then-President Donald Trump's plan to shift millions of dollars from military construction projects toward building a wall along the Mexican border. Tillis eventually changed his position and supported Trump's plan, but conservatives never forgot his initial stance.
Democratic group mostly right about Tillis vote to redirect military money

The final straw for the GOP base, Brody said, was Tillis' work on the Respect For Marriage Act last year, which codified legal protections for same-sex marriage--something the GOP officially opposes in its national and state party platforms, Brody said.

The Hill ends with this 100% true statement from Josh Hawley:

"The great divide of our time is not between Trump supporters and Trump opponents, or between suburban voters and rural ones, or between Red America and Blue America," he said. "No, the great divide of our time is between the political agenda of the leadership elite and the great and broad middle of our society. And to answer the discontent of our time, we must end that divide."

Oh no, will attacks on the failed, incompetent leadership class make it more difficult for them to control us?!

posted by Ace at 04:15 PM

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