Bellelettres
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One Republican could punish Trump for his Putin apostasy
This is very interesting to me:
How just one Republican could punish Trump for his Putin apostasy — and why no one will
by Aaron Blake
July 18
Republicans will criticize President Trump's news conference with Vladimir Putin and then probably not actually do anything about it. Most everyone doesn't expect Republicans to truly revolt over anything short of video showing Trump telling Putin which Democratic groups to hack.
But some hopeful souls have settled upon a new Way To Stop Trump that requires just one brave Republican. With Sen. John McCain battling brain cancer, the Senate effectively has a 50-to-49 GOP majority. And that means it takes only one GOP senator to reverse the majority.
Former Obama White House press secretary Dan Pfeiffer said vocal Trump critics Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) and Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) could make the stand by refusing to vote for Trump's nominee to the Supreme Court, Brett M. Kavanaugh. Just one of them could secure concessions up to and including a vote on a bill to protect special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, implement more Russia sanctions or subpoena the interpreter who was in Trump and Putin's private meeting.
Democrats have suggested that these members could vote against things such as the GOP's tax cuts bill as a means to protest Trump. But these are conservatives who are voting for conservative legislation. This has been their chance, with GOP control of both chambers of Congress, to actually pass the things they spent years and even decades in Congress hoping to accomplish.
But it's one thing to expect them to do that over Trump saying something off-color or destroying a few political norms; it's another when these same members of Congress are warning about Trump selling out to America's enemies. And the fact is that one of them could have the leverage, if they truly wanted to sacrifice themselves, to hold Kavanaugh or anything else hostage.
There are myriad reasons this won't happen.
The first is no assurances of success. If just one Democrat, such as Sens. Joe Manchin III (W.Va.) or Joe Donnelly (Ind.), were to cross over on Kavanaugh, the blockade would be rendered meaningless. It might be easier for Democrats to unite against Kavanaugh if they have a Republican on their side, but that wouldn't be easy for Manchin, Donnelly, Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (N.D.) or any number of other red-state Democrats who face reelection.
The second is that the endgame is far from certain. Trump doesn't often back down and wouldn't like having his Supreme Court pick held hostage. It's an open question as to how much he actually care about tilting the Supreme Court conservative. It’s something other Republicans probably want more than he does. If this is a standoff, Trump seems to be unlikely to blink first, knowing how much Republicans want the thing they'd be blocking. (And that goes double if he's truly afraid of what Mueller might produce.)
And third is the member's own legacy. Republicans have a finite amount of time to confirm the new justice before they potentially lose their majority in the November election. Whoever would make the decision to take a stand would have to be willing to be the Republican who maybe prevented conservatives from getting a 5-to-4 Supreme Court majority.
https://tinyurl.com/y7eyr2bl
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7/18/2018, 2:19 pm
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