Mediaboss Marketing

The decision, issued Friday, was a landmark victory for conservatives who have held up overturning Roe as an ambition of near-biblical significance, fundraising, organizing and legislating off opposition to abortion rights for nearly half a century.

Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade

The Supreme Court has voted to strike down Roe v. Wade, the landmark case that upheld abortion rights for the past 50 years.

But its a victory that will almost certainly come at a cost. In Republican circles, a consensus has been forming for weeks that the courts overturning of a significant and highly popular precedent on a deeply felt issue will be a liability for the party in the midterms and beyond, undercutting Republicans to at least some degree with moderates and suburban women.

Before Roe came down, said a former Republican congressman familiar with the partys campaign operation, Everything was going our way. Gas is above $5. Inflation is a giant problem.

The only thing [Democrats] have got going for them is the Roe thing, which is what, 40 years of settled law that will be changed that will cause some societal consternation, said the former congressman, granted anonymity to speak candidly. And can they turn that into some turnout? I think the answer is probably Yes.

Maybe instead of losing 45 seats, they lose 30, he said, while at a minimum, there will be a few seats that Republicans would have won without [the abortion rights decision], and they may not win them now.

Almost no political professional Republican or Democrat expects the courts decision on abortion to upend the electoral landscape severely enough to keep Republicans from winning the House in November. In recent elections, abortion has not been the motivating issue that Democrats once anticipated it might be, and even polling earlier this month, when Roe was widely expected to be overturned, had abortion falling below other concerns, including jobs and the economy, as an issue of significance to voters.

You go to any diner in America, and nobodys talking about this, said Dave Carney, a national Republican strategist based in New Hampshire. Thats not whats driving the conversation. Real people, working people, people who vote, are talking about the incompetence of the president, and then they go down the list of six or seven things, including the rising price of goods and the recent baby formula shortage.

The problem for Republicans with the Roe decision is that its giving Democrats something to grasp onto in an otherwise bleak year the kind of issue that may animate some lower-propensity voters, including young Democrats, to turn out in November, and blunt the GOPs appeals to independent voters, a majority of whom also support Roe, according to Gallup.

Republicans, said Sarah Longwell, a moderate Republican strategist who became a vocal supporter of Joe Biden in 2020, are now the dog that caught the car.

Then what? The motivation moves to the left in terms of who feels theyre the ones who have to be on offense, she said. People will fight harder for a thing that they want rather than reward people for a thing they already have.

One Republican operative familiar with polling in federal and state races and spoke on condition of anonymity said the most important impact may be on swing voters who lean Republican. It takes a sizeable bloc of voters who were leaning [Republican], and it gives them reason to vote Democrat, he said. And they havent had any reason to vote Democrat in quite a while.

Paradoxically, the politics of the Roe reversal would likely not be so distressing for Republicans if everything else wasnt going so well for them. Bidens public approval rating, a metric closely tied to a partys performance in the midterms, has sunk below 40 percent, according to the FiveThirtyEight polling average, worse than former President Barack Obamas was at this point in the run-up to Democrats midterm shellacking in 2010. Inflation is already souring the electorate, and a recession may be next.

But even if Roe alone is not sufficient to remake the midterms in Democrats favor, it could fit into what Longwell called an overall case the Democratic Party should be prosecuting against Republicans wedding Roe with the courts decision the previous day on gun control, among other issues, to depict the post-Donald Trump GOP as one still animated by extremes.

On Friday, the court provided fodder for that line of attack, when Justice Clarence Thomas, in a concurring opinion, argued the court should reconsider protections for contraception access and same-sex marriage. And the post-Roe fallout itself will reverberate in states for months, focusing attention on state-level campaigns as red-leaning states prepare to enact restrictions.

Already, Republicans are wincing at the consequences. In the swing state of Pennsylvania, Democrats have been pummeling the Republican gubernatorial nominee, Doug Mastriano, for a position opposing abortion rights that includes no exceptions for rape, incest or the life of the mother. In Georgia, another swing state, the Republican U.S. Senate nominee, Herschel Walker, is facing similar criticism. In a message that Democrats will likely repeat for months, incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock issued a fundraising appeal on Friday afternoon with the subject line: Our opponent says he wants a total ban on abortion.

Jason Roe, the former executive director of the state Republican Party in Michigan, described himself as nervous about it because the opportunities we should have with suburban women become more complicated when that issue is on the table, and I think it puts us on defense.

For nearly 50 years, ever since Roe v. Wade was issued in 1973, it has been the opposite, with Republicans on a sustained offensive to overturn the decision chipping away at its protections in red-leaning states, working to advance conservative judicial nominees and invoking the issue as a litmus test in GOP primaries. And publicly, conservatives on Friday did take a victory lap.

Life wins! Ronna McDaniel, the chair of the Republican National Committee, said in a prepared statement. Millions of Americans are celebrating todays ruling and a pro-life movement that has worked tirelessly for decades.

But Republicans running in elections this year have been preparing since the publication of a draft ruling last month in POLITICO to turn the political debate away from Roe as sharply as possible, seemingly cognizant of its downsides. In a messaging memo obtained by Axios in May, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the partys campaign arm, urged Republicans to depict Democrats as fixated on extreme views on abortion, while asserting that Republicans support for abortion restrictions is reasonable and Republicans are focused on getting the economy back on track and keeping your family safe.

Republicans wont want to deflect from the economy whatsoever, said former North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory, who ran unsuccessfully for a U.S. Senate seat this year, because thats what people are feeling every day.

It may not be possible for Republicans to maintain that level of discipline. Partly, thats because Democrats will relentlessly fan the issue in the run-up to November. But its also because one significant segment of the Republican Party anti-abortion activists want to talk about Roe, too, especially as states this summer take up post-Roe restriction.

Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, one of the nations leading anti-abortion groups, said this week that along with its partner organizations, it plans to spend $78 million this election cycle. In recent weeks, anti-abortion advocates have been briefing Republican lawmakers and candidates on ways to campaign on the issue in a post-Roe landscape, arming them with polling that suggests Americans, while overwhelmingly saying abortion should be legal in all or most cases, nevertheless express openness to some restrictions.

We cant choose when the Supreme Court acts, and certainly the left will come roaring out of the starting gate, as theyve indicated they will. So, we just have to engage and present the other side.

Bob Heckman, a Republican strategist who has worked on nine presidential campaigns.

This is the Democrats Hail Mary pass, said Bob Heckman, a Republican strategist who has worked on nine presidential campaigns. They cant win on the economy, they cant win on foreign policy, they cant win on cultural issues, and they are going to want to have this discussion, and I dont think we can deflect.

But Heckman, who consults for Susan B. Anthony, said conservatives, too, have wanted to have a nationwide debate about this since 1973, and now were going to have one. And as Republicans and conservatives and advocates for life, now were going to have to go out and make our case and win it.

Every poll and political strategist of both parties would suggest that any other issue this year is riper for Republicans to exploit and that, politically, there is little upside for the GOP in the shifting focus to Roe.

Still, Heckman said, We cant choose when the Supreme Court acts, and certainly the left will come roaring out of the starting gate, as theyve indicated they will. So, we just have to engage and present the other side.

He added, I think its a case we can win.

Here is the original post:
'The dog that caught the car': Republicans brace for the impact of reversing Roe - POLITICO

POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y. For most of his early political career, Lee M. Zeldin was a classic Long Island moderate Republican: As an Army officer elected to the State Senate, he worked with Democrats to champion causes like tax cuts, veterans benefits and even beer, protecting breweries in his district and elsewhere.

That centrism began to fade after Mr. Zeldin was elected to Congress in 2014 and was cast off completely after the election of President Donald J. Trump. Mr. Zeldin was one of the earlier House Republicans to embrace Mr. Trump, a fealty that culminated in his vote to overturn the results of the 2020 election in key swing states.

Now, Mr. Zeldin may be forced to reconcile his past and present stances as he pursues a run for governor this year, a tricky balancing act that will require him to win a surprisingly fractious four-way Republican primary on Tuesday and then try to appeal to a far more moderate general electorate.

Mr. Zeldin has largely stayed in the right lane, voicing allegiance to an array of conservative touchstones, including support for the Second Amendment, rejection of abortion and a devotion to Mr. Trump.

Even so, he on some occasions has seemed mindful of the general election audience, a nuance that has emerged in subtle ways in debates, interviews and on the stump.

Mr. Zeldin, for example, celebrated the Supreme Courts decision overturning Roe v. Wade on Friday, calling it a victory for life, for family, for the constitution, and for federalism and adding that New York clearly needs to do a much better job to promote, respect and defend life. But last month, before the decision, he had also been keen to stress that nothing changes for states like New York, which have enshrined abortion rights.

On the Second Amendment, Mr. Zeldin cheered the Supreme Courts decision on Thursday to strike down a century-old law that placed strict limits on the carrying of handguns, calling it a historic, proper and necessary victory. He also says he would like to overturn a 2013 state law the Safe Act that tightened state guns laws.

But after the recent massacre at a Buffalo supermarket, Mr. Zeldin walked back a call for the abolition of so-called red-flag laws, which prohibit gun ownership for those deemed a threat to themselves and others. He clarified that he simply felt such laws shouldnt apply to law-abiding New Yorkers.

And even as Mr. Zeldin has attacked rivals for being never-Trumpers and Republicans in name only, he has stopped short of saying the 2020 election was stolen and didnt exactly endorse a 2024 Trump campaign during the candidates first debate.

If President Trump wants to run, Mr. Zeldin said, he should run.

On Tuesday, too, when asked during the candidates final debate hosted by Newsmax, the conservative cable network if he was politically closer to Mr. Trump or former Vice President Mike Pence, Mr. Zeldin demurred, saying he was his own man and drew a mixed reaction from a live audience in Rochester.

Indeed, the challenge facing Mr. Zeldin, the putative front-runner endorsed by the state Republican Party, is one facing all four party candidates ahead of the primary on Tuesday: How to appeal to primary voters, hungry for red-meat issues like crime, immigration and social welfare, while not alienating more moderate swing voters who are dissatisfied with President Biden or Gov. Kathy Hochul, the incumbent Democrat favored to win her primary on Tuesday.

Such a balancing act, political consultants from both parties say, is central to achieving one of the most daunting tasks in American politics: winning a statewide race in New York as a Republican.

No Republican has done so since George E. Pataki won a third term as governor in 2002. And in the decades since, the task has become even more difficult as the states demographics have steadily drifted left while New York Republicans once known for centrists like former governor Nelson A. Rockefeller have banked hard to the right.

Right now, you have a race to the absolute bottom, said Jefrey Pollock, the veteran pollster who is working with Ms. Hochul, referring to what he described as the Republicans pandering to right-wing voters. So what you get is Republican candidates who are going to be incredibly out of step with general election voters on things that are going to be in the news, like guns and abortion and Donald Trump.

Mr. Zeldins victory in the primary is far from assured, with a spirited challenge coming from three rivals: Rob Astorino, the former Westchester County executive; Harry Wilson, a corporate turnaround specialist; and Andrew Giuliani, the son of the former New York City mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani.

Some voter surveys have shown Mr. Giuliani running a close second, or even surpassing, Mr. Zeldin in the closing weeks of the campaign.

Even if Mr. Zeldin is the winner on Tuesday, it will be an uphill climb to the governors mansion in Albany. In pure statistical terms, Republicans are a third party in New York, trailing Democrats by more than three million registered members, and also outnumbered by nonaffiliated voters. And the calculus for Republicans winning in a statewide election generally means winning at least 30 percent of the vote in New York City, which is heavily Democratic.

Still, with voters across the country rejecting Democratic leadership, and concern about crime and cost of living spiking in New York, Republicans believe this year could be an exception to that terrible track record. Even Democrats acknowledge that it could be a good year for Republicans, who lost their last foothold of power in Albany control of the State Senate in the 2018 elections.

Mr. Zeldin insists that his proposed policies will remain constant even after the primary, emphasizing that he believes New Yorkers are most focused on kitchen-table issues like the economy, taxes and public safety.

These are issues that resonate with Republicans, these are issues that also resonate with independents, and theyre resonating with Democrats as well, he said in an interview, adding that while the conversation may be different in a general election, on issues like guns, My positions wont change. My positions dont change.

Like other Republicans, hes also tried to emphasize less polarizing policies mocking the geniuses in Albany and laying out ideas like stopping out-migration from the state, as well as reducing crime and government mandates.

We rule the government, he said. They dont rule us.

Likewise, Mr. Zeldins Republican primary opponents seem aware of the calculations Republicans must make with voters.

Mr. Wilson, a wealthy Greek American who was raised in Johnstown, N.Y., and now lives in Scarsdale, N.Y., is probably the campaigns closest approximation of a moderate, having voiced support for abortion rights and advised the Treasury Department under President Barack Obama. He says he refused to vote for Mr. Trump in 2020 and wrote in Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina and United Nations ambassador under Mr. Trump.

Mr. Wilson, who has plowed more than $10 million of his own money into his campaign, has also shunned litmus tests on social issues, saying hes running on an economic platform. He prefers to speak in wonky bullet points about overhauling state government and producing more housing units.

What Im trying to do is lay out very clearly how different I am than any other candidate, said Mr. Wilson said in a recent interview. You used the term moderate. I think about it as someone who is not a politician an outsider who has spent his entire career fixing failed organizations. And we need to hire a governor who has the capability to fix the most failed state government in the country.

Mr. Astorino, the former Westchester County executive, knows about the challenges of winning statewide in New York; he was the partys unsuccessful nominee for governor in 2014. Still, hes touted something Republicans have often pushed aside in primary contests in recent years: electability. He argues that Mr. Zeldins trail of votes in Albany and Washington has made him toxic to many New Yorkers.

Im the most electable Republican in this race, he said, noting his record winning Democratic crossover votes in overwhelmingly blue Westchester County.

In an interview, Mr. Astorino played down the impact of Mr. Trumps shadow over the race, insisting that voters would focus more on real-life concerns than on whom Mr. Trump might favor.

Theres the quality of life, the chaos, the dangerousness, the radicalism thats taken hold because of the progressives right now, he said. All of that is subplot in this, but the basics are the economy, taxes, jobs and crime.

In the first debate, Mr. Astorino also went further than any other candidate in tying Mr. Trump to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, calling it a horrible day in our nations history, and saying that Mr. Trump bears some responsibility.

Mr. Giuliani seems to be the most willing to embrace far-right talking points, seemingly hoping to energize the base by leaning on his father and emphasizing divisive culture-war topics. He railed against the leftist media, consideration for transgender people and critical race theory.

Mr. Giuliani, who worked in the Trump administration for four years, has also actively sought Mr. Trumps backing and unequivocally voiced his belief in the baseless conspiracy theory that Mr. Trump had won the 2020 election, the outcome of which he called one of the greatest crimes in American history.

But in terms of political accomplishments and experience, Mr. Zeldin, who has represented the eastern part of Long Island since 2015, seems to have the upper hand.

Trained as a lawyer, Mr. Zeldin passed the bar at the age of 23 and served in the U.S. Army as an intelligence officer and prosecutor, as well as being deployed to Iraq with the 82d Airborne in 2006. He still serves in the Army Reserve; married with two twin daughters, Mr. Zeldin likes to joke that he is the fourth highest- ranking person in his family.

On a recent Thursday night, in front of a well-dressed coterie of Republican faithful at an elegant event space in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., Mr. Zeldin noted all the reasons he had for not running for governor, including the fact that he could have easily won another term and perhaps had a leadership position in a potential Republican majority in the House.

But he said he was called to run to save our state, arguing in a catch phrase from his campaign that losing is not an option.

Im not in this race to win a primary, Mr. Zeldin said, stirring the audience to its feet. Im in this race to win in November.

Read this article:
N.Y. Republican Quandary: How to Veer Right and Still Win in November - The New York Times

Republicans are upping the ante with more aggressive and urgent messaging on the border crisis less than five months out from the midterm elections.

State leaders and lawmakers in Congress have torn into President Joe Biden for his handling of the U.S.-Mexico border crisis for nearly a year and a half, but they amplified their concerns this week, bringing their border solutions front and center as a plethora of other concerns (inflation, Ukraine, and abortion) fight for the attention of voters.

From my perspective, it's been a big issue. And it will continue to be one with all the folks coming across, said Brendan Steinhauser, a veteran GOP operative who led successful campaigns for Sen. John Cornyn and Rep. Dan Crenshaw of Texas. Just the sheer numbers, the volume, I think that's what's driving a lot of this because Gov. Abbott, congressman Chip Roy, and others are saying the federal government continues not to do anything.

Roy debuted a plan on Monday to address loopholes in immigration law that he argued allow noncitizens to cross the border illegally, then get released into the United States, leading more people to come knowing they may not be deported. More than any policy, Roy said the Republican Party needs to find its voice on the issue.

CARAVAN MIGRANTS NEAR U.S. BORDER AS OTHER GROUPS CROSS INTO TEXAS

It doesnt have to be this way," Roy wrote in an opinion article for the Washington Examiner. "The people both need and deserve a secure border, but ending the crisis is going to require Republicans in Washington, D.C., to grow a spine, dig in, and fight to keep their promises for once.

"If the people ever again entrust Republicans to lead the House of Representatives or any other part of the federal government, there can be no more excuses, Roy said, calling on the party to force the completion of Trump-era border wall projects, remove all illegal immigrants in the country, and unabashedly go after cartels.

Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX), who is seeking a third term in office this November, endorsed Roys detailed plan in a post on Twitter and called for the hundreds of Republicans running for House and Senate seats this year to follow suit.

Eight GOP senators then released a 56-page report detailing how the Biden administrations border and immigration policies encourage illegal migration and have put national security in jeopardy.

The number of migrants encountered attempting to enter the U.S. illegally from Mexico rose in May, surpassing all previous records over the past century, an indication of the scale of the illegal immigration crisis at the border.

U.S. border officials intercepted 239,416 migrants attempting to enter the country illegally last month, the fourth consecutive monthly rise. In the first 16 full months of Biden's term in office, federal law enforcement officials at the southern border have stopped noncitizens attempting to cross into the U.S. without permission 2.975 million times, including migrants who were denied admission at ports of entry.

President Bidens border crisis continues to shatter records. This is a national security nightmare that only gets worse by the day, echoed Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY). Its time for the White House to act. Our report lays out immediate steps the Biden administration can take right now to secure our border. Tackling the root causes of illegal immigration and reinstating important Trump-era reforms that we know work will help stop the surge of migrants from overrunning our border.

On Wednesday, Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) held a press conference on Capitol Hill alongside the head of the Border Patrol union, Brandon Judd, to call on Biden to visit the border. Biden has not visited the southern border since taking office.

"You need to go to the border and hear from the agents in the communities in Texas and Arizona, the hell it's like to live along the southern border," Graham said. "President Biden, if you do not go to our border to visit firsthand and see what's going on and to hear from the Border Patrol agents themselves, you're letting down your country, you're derelict in your duty, and there will be repercussions ... for that lack of interest here in the Senate."

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

Holding Democrats' feet to the fire could prove a successful tactic for Republicans if they win back majorities in the House and Senate, leaving Democrats with control of the White House, Steinhauser said.

"If you're Biden and you have a huge midterm loss and your approval rating is low and you've got all these issues maybe if Republicans come to you and say, 'All right, you do these things on border security, and we'll give you some stuff on the dreamers.' I don't think it's that crazy," Steinhauser said. "Republicans can sort of tell the base, 'Hey, we got the security measures done.' The business community on the Republican side might feel good about some of the other things. And then Biden can say, 'I got something done.'"

More:
The week Republicans got serious about the border - Washington Examiner

MAGA was always supposed to be about taking our country back. But do Donald Trumps most ardent soldiers even want to be part of the United States of America?

Texas Republicans not only want to secede but also imagine that after backing out of our country, they would live in an Eden of their own creation where there are no state or federal income taxes. How this penniless republic would then fund even basic services, much less build infrastructure and raise an army, not even God knows. But the states record of running its own power grid isnt a hopeful indicator.

Were this fantasy ever realized, of course, Republicans would elect no more American presidents. This year, such a withdrawal would mean that Democrats would hold both the House and Senate.

Im not sure if the sort of person whod consider NRA favorite Sen. John Cornyn a sellout for trying to do even a little something about mass shootings knows that none of this is going to happen.

But the law-and-order party is definitely pushing Texans to ignore any federal law that it decides should be ignored, opposed, refused, and nullified. On Juneteenth, the party declared that it wanted to start by repealing the Voting Rights Act.

Texas schools should, according to the GOP platform, be required to teach the evils of socialism, while climate science and even evolution would be presented as challengeable.

Already, among Republicans not just in Texas but across the country, elections are legitimate only if the right candidate wins. Which is how the Texas GOP knows that Joe Biden is not our legitimate president, though somehow, all of the other candidates elected in 2020, when the GOP overall did very well, are perfectly legitimate officeholders.

This is not just moving to the right but moving to the alt-universe in which Republicans who have not lost their way are considered the enemy, too. And not just the enemy, but the rightful prey of the righteous.

I refer, of course, to the loathsome new commercial from Missouri Senate candidate Eric Greitens, the disgraced former governor, who has declared open season on RINOs, or Republicans in name only. The GOP leader of the Missouri Senate called the police after seeing the ad.

It shows the candidate, along with his pump-action shotgun and a bunch of other guys in tactical gear, storming a house in search of those Republicans who dont agree with him that reality is whatever dark MAGA men say it is.

As Tuesdays Jan. 6 committee hearing again made clear, it was brave Republicans RINOs, as MAGA would have it who did save our country after Biden was elected.

Arizona House Speaker Russell Bowers described being pressured by Trump and his lawyer Rudy Giuliani to convene a committee to replace the states electors with a slate willing to vote for Trump instead. I will not break my oath to the state and U.S. Constitution, Bowers told them.

Bowers kept asking them for evidence that the massive fraud they were describing had actually occurred. And they kept putting him off, telling him that they did have proof without ever producing any. At one point, Bowers said, Giuliani came out and said, Weve got lots of theories; we just dont have the evidence.

The loopy lawyer formerly seen as Americas mayor tried to convince him to overlook that technicality and put his party first, asking, Arent we all Republicans here?

Yes, of the sort that some Democrats dont believe exist, and that Trump and his allies dont want to survive unscathed.

Asked to read from the journal Bowers kept at the time when Trump was leaning on him, he did: I do not want to be a winner by cheating, he wrote. I will not play with laws I swore allegiance to with any contrived desire towards deflection of my deep foundational desire to follow Gods will, as I believe he led my conscience to embrace. How else will I ever approach Him in the wilderness of life, knowing that I ask for this guidance only to show myself a coward in defending the course he led me to take?

Bowers also talked about the threats he and his family had received, and about how upset his gravely ill grown daughter had been about protesters in his neighborhood blaring lies calling him a pedophile. She isnt upset anymore because she died in late January, but does that make MAGA world ashamed? You know the answer.

Republican election officials from Georgia also testified about being pressured to pretend that there had been widespread fraud that they tried to find but couldnt. While Trumps legal team claimed that 10,315 dead voters had cast ballots in the state, for instance, Republican officials found only four. They found 0 underage voters.

Fulton County election worker Shaye Moss testified that she and her mother, also an election worker, had been forced into hiding after Giuliani claimed that they had changed the outcome in Georgia by bringing in suitcases of fake Biden ballots and scanning them multiple times.

GOP officials said that all the video Giuliani had claimed proved fraud actually showed was the normal process playing out. The suitcase was the usual carrying receptacle for votes. And that memory stick that Moss mother had supposedly handed her, and that Giuliani had told the world proved she was as guilty as a drug dealer passing off a vial of cocaine?

It was a ginger mint, said Moss, who like every other election worker in that video has since left her job.

Since then, Trump supporters have succeeded in replacing many of the Republicans who did put country above party who still recognize laws they might not like and winners for whom they did not vote with those who do not.

Theyve been replaced by those whose view of American democracy is so far from anything the founders they claim to love ever believed that its no wonder some want to exit this country and start a new one.

The Jan. 6 committee is right to make Republicans who did the right thing under extreme pressure the heroes of these hearings. Because if the American experiment is going to continue, were going to need many more like them.

Go here to read the rest:
Column: MAGA secessionists versus the Republicans who really did save our country after 2020 - Yakima Herald-Republic

Rusty Bowers, the speaker of the Arizona house of representatives, wanted Donald Trump to win the 2020 election. He worked hard to elect him and, when the time came, cast his ballot for the president.

What he wasnt willing to do was cheat for him.

In searing and at turns emotional testimony, Bowers, a rock-ribbed conservative from battleground Arizona, recounted for the House select committee investigating the January 6 assault how he resisted a relentless campaign by the then president of the United States and his allies to do just that.

You are asking me to do something against my oath and I will not break my oath, Bowers said he responded, when pressured repeatedly by Trump and his allies to overturn Joe Bidens victory in the state.

Bowers comments helped reveal how much of a threat to American democracy Trumps attempt to block Joe Bidens win was and how it was defeated by the actions of officials like Bowers. But, amid a continuing attempt by Trump and his Republican allies to peddle lies and control election races in 2024 battleground states, it also revealed the threat to the US is not over.

The presidents lie was and is a dangerous cancer on the body politic, said the California congressman Adam Schiff, who led the hearing. If you can convince Americans that they cannot trust their own elections, that anytime they lose, it is somehow illegitimate, then what is left but violence to determine who should govern.

Trump lost the state of Arizona by less than 11,000 votes votes that were legally cast and fairly counted, Bowers said. But Trump refused to accept his loss and in his denial concocted a plot to try to stop the state from certifying the election results based on groundless conspiracies that Bowers likened to a tragic parody.

In perhaps his most damning disclosure, Bowers recalled a conversation in which Trumps personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani told him: Weve got lots of theories. We just dont have the evidence.

Bowers said the comment was so absurd that he and his staff wondered if it was a gaffe and laughed about it. But he found little reason for levity during Tuesdays hearing.

Bowers was joined in the cavernous Cannon Caucus Room by the Georgia secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, and his deputy, Gabe Sterling, also a Republican, who testified about the pressure Trump and his legal team put on elections officials in their state.

In a phone call after the November election, Trump asked Raffensperger to find 11,780 votes just enough to flip Bidens election victory in the state.

Their refusal to obey Trumps demands was met with a barrage of online harassment and intimidation. Raffensperger said all of his personal information was made public. His wife began receiving sexually explicit threats and someone broke into the home of his daughter-in-law, a widow with two children. Bowers at the time was caring for his dying daughter who he said was troubled by the menacing crowd that gathered outside his home, pelting taunts and threats. During the hearing, Bowers read a passage from his journal.

It is painful to have friends who have been such a help to me turn on me with such rancor, he wrote in December. I do not want to be a winner by cheating. I will not play with laws I swore allegiance to.

Sterling became a standout figure when he called on Trump to stop riling up his supporters during a televised press conference held in the tumultuous post-election period while Georgia carried out a series of recounts. Death threats, physical threats, intimidation its too much, its not right, Sterling said in his remarks, parts of which the committee showed during the hearing. He told his committee he lost it that day after being told that a young election contractor with Dominion Systems was receiving death threats from purveyors of the QAnon conspiracy theory.

I tend to turn red from here up when that happens. And that happened at that time, he said.

Lives and livelihoods were disrupted and destroyed as a result of Trumps lies, the committee heard. Wandrea Shaye Moss, a former Georgia election worker, testified on Tuesday that she no longer felt safe, secure or confident since becoming the subject of one of Trumps most pernicious fraud claims one involving suitcases that both federal and state officials said was baseless.

Tuesdays witnesses were all that stood between what the chairman of the committee, Congressman Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, described as a close call and a catastrophe for American democracy, during its fourth public hearing. It also revealed new details in the brazen, if ill-conceived, scheme to put forward fake slates of electors in seven states as part of a last-gasp attempt to keep Trump in power.

Again and again the committee has sought to show that the violent insurrection on 6 January, horrible as it was, isnt the whole story. Nor is it the end of the story. Its part of a coordinated and continuing plot by the former president and his allies to remain in power by any means possible.

Focus on the evidence the committee will present. Dont be distracted by politics, the committees vice-chair, the Republican congresswoman Liz Cheney of Wyoming, urged viewers. This is serious. We cannot let America become a nation of conspiracy theories and thug violence.

Trumps big lie, the committee said, was a dangerous precursor to the deadly insurrection on 6 January. But it remains an urgent threat to democracy.

Trump continues to claim that he won the 2020 election and polls suggest millions of Republicans believe him. Indeed, before the hearing he claimed Bowers had said the Arizona election was rigged and he actually won the state. Under oath, Bowers said Trumps recollection of their conversation was categorically false.

Nevertheless, embracing the lie has become a requisite for his endorsement, which has delivered mixed results in Republican primaries. In Georgia, Raffensperger overcame a Trump-backed challenger to win re-election as the states attorney general.

But elsewhere, election deniers are winning primaries in an attempt to seize control of elections administration in key states across the country. In Pennsylvania, where the governor appoints the secretary of state, Republicans chose a nominee who helped organize the rally that preceded the attack on 6 January and has openly mused about fraud in future elections.

And across the country, election workers like Moss are being driven out by threats of violence and intimidation. In some instances, election watchdogs have warned, they are being replaced by partisans and conspiracy theorists.

Look no further than New Mexico, Thompson said on Tuesday, where a Republican commission refused to certify the results of the states primary election, citing unfounded claims about the security of the voting machines. The commission ultimately bowed to an order by the states supreme court and certified the election but the committee said it was a blinking red warning sign ahead of the 2022 and 2024 elections.

The system held, but barely, Schiff said. And the question remains, will it hold again.

The rest is here:
A few good Republicans stopped Trump but his threat to democracy isnt over - The Guardian US