Sometimes the shifting sands will move very quietly, almost imperceptibly. This could be one of those moments where historians will look back and say, “It was that Texas House seat, the one where Trump endorsed the guy’s widow and she lost, that was the beginning of the end.” Susan Wright, widow of Ron Wright who died after testing positive for COVID-19, was the darling of Donald Trump. He endorsed her, he mentioned her in Arizona last weekend, he did a telerally for her. And she lost to her challenger, Jake Ellzey. Could that mean that the benediction of Trump has lost its power? The Hill:
Jake Ellzey defeated fellow Republican Susan Wright in a special runoff in Texas’s 6th Congressional District on Tuesday night, dealing a blow to both her and former President Trump, who had backed Wright in the race.
The Associated Press called the race for Ellzey, who won more than 53 percent of the vote with nearly all precincts reporting.
Ellzey and Wright were the top vote-getters in a May special election in which nobody won an outright majority of the vote, sparking the Tuesday contest. […]
Conservatives had also sought to downplay Ellzey’s Republican bona fides by highlighting a past donation he received from Bill Kristol, a prominent GOP critic of Trump.
Ellzey had the backing of former Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) and Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas), and while he did not have as high-profile backers as Wright was able to outraise her by about $1 million.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R), a Trump ally himself, was quick to congratulate Ellzey.
“Jake will be a strong and effective leader for the people of North Texas and he will fight tirelessly for their values in Washington,” Abbott said in a statement. “I look forward to working alongside Jake as we keep Texas the greatest state in the nation.”
A couple of takeaways here: Trump is feared because of his control over the much vaunted “base.” Maybe the base isn’t as big as people think. In this case, the base didn’t swing the election for the Trump endorsed candidate.
Another thought is that the remnants of the Republican party are trying to unite and rebuild the party. The Never Trumpers saw the damage Trump could do right off the bat and they weren’t wrong. It’s possible that this faction of the party has more power than we have been led to believe.
Either way, if I was gung ho Trump and had sold my soul, like Kevin McCarthy and Elise Stefanik, I would be wondering right now if I was backing the right horse. If Susan Wright went down in flames, maybe it’s only a question of time before all Trump-endorsed candidates find out that the Orange Overlord is not all powerful. Won’t that be a rude awakening?
Before I break out what’s left of my election Jack Daniel’s for a toast or two I’m going to wait a while. Unless I’m mistaken there’s another special election coming up soon in Ohio – one in which Trump has also been putting in some effort to anoint the winner. If his candidate loses that one, if there’s a close “one-two combination punch” then maybe it will cause that shifting of the sands under the proverbial house of Trumpism.
SO … what kind of timeframe are we expecting to suffer while waiting through the served papers and actual, “Sworn testimony”, of the Trump clan, you know, the ones that NEVER LIE, always follow the Constitution and never break with rules of law … /S
It’s interesting how the power of Congress continues to be tested in respect to getting cooperation from Trump witnesses, however, something tells me the wind below Trump’s wings is becoming quite turbulent and unstable, due to the GOP collapse of unity with getting caught up in “THE BIG LIE”, so much guilt for so little gains …
Who wants to bet that Trump will very shortly come out declaring he supports Ellzey wholeheartedly and he always supported Ellzey and that any support of the widow Wright was just “fake news” put out by Trump’s many enemies to make him look bad?
ETTD.
Keep the drumbeat of showing trump as TRAITOR! He fermented a war on truth over months & years, cheated his way into power, tried to do it a second time, impeached twice, criminal grifter, pathological liar, & malignant narcissist, fermented & set off an attempted coup January 6th AS PRESIDENT. A cruel pampered, pompous, pinheaded, pimp. Keep showing everything about the insurrection. Drag everyone into court & see if they have the balls to perjure themselves. Since they are lying cowards, I doubt it. Charge the ones you can & imprison them. Nixon’s partners in crime were walked into court as a group, & sent to jail. Including John mitchell, the former attorney general. Give bullfrog barr jail time to research what the word ‘suggestion’ means.
Personally, I was hoping that someone else might pop out of the woodwork and beat both of them. Oh well, that’s politics.
I kind of wonder if a woman or POC can win the Trump base vote…if it were an establishment woman against a Trumpy man, would this have turned out different?
Usually I wouldn’t apply that sort of demographic logic, but I have so little respect for the Trump base I feel it might be the case.