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After weeks of escalating criticism, Assembly Republican Leader Chad Mayes still doesnt have any regrets over bucking his party to support Californias cap-and-trade program on climate change.

Theres just one thing Mayes would have done differently: He wishes he had attended the ceremony on San Franciscos Treasure Island where Gov. Jerry Brown signed the legislation.

The perception was, He didnt go because he was getting heat. Thats not how I operate, Mayes said, explaining his absence as a scheduling conflict. When you do the right thing, its a good idea to stand by that.

Whether he did the right thing is a question that has engulfed Californias struggling Republican Party.

For Mayes and his allies, voting for the global warming legislation was a bid to show voters that Republicans are serious about tackling an issue important to Californians. The final law prevented more stringent regulations by extending the cap-and-trade program, which requires companies to buy permits to emit greenhouse gases.

But for conservative critics, the entire episode was a betrayal of party principles and a tactical blunder. In their eyes, Mayes did nothing more than help liberals increase costs for California businesses and then take a victory lap. They accuse him of providing political cover to Democrats in the state Capitol while ignoring the wishes of his caucus, the majority of which opposed the legislation.

Perhaps worst of all, they said, a grinning Mayes posed for chummy photos with Brown and top Democratic lawmakers after the vote. Shawn Steel, one of Californias two representatives on the Republican National Committee, called it repugnant.

What Chad has done is given us a big fat skunk on our plate, and hes really hurt the party, Steel said.

In a photo one Republican called "repugnant," Mayes is flanked by Gov. Jerry Brown, Senate leader Kevin Len and Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon after the cap-and-trade vote. On the left is Republican Assemblyman Rocky Chavez, who also voted for the legislation.

In a photo one Republican called "repugnant," Mayes is flanked by Gov. Jerry Brown, Senate leader Kevin Len and Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon after the cap-and-trade vote. On the left is Republican Assemblyman Rocky Chavez, who also voted for the legislation.

The dispute has led to the rare spectacle of top state Republican officials openly campaigning to oust a member of their party from a leadership position. County chairs, local committees and powerful donor groups have called on him to step down including the GOP leaders of his home county of San Bernardino and the state partys board of directors is expected to vote on the issue Friday.

At a weekend tea party gathering in Fresno, the partys most conservative activists called for Mayes to be challenged by another Republican in the 2018 election.

Tim Donnelly, a conservative former assemblyman who unsuccessfully ran for governor in 2014, called on tea party members to take Mayes down.

I think every single Republican in the state of California should make it their business to make phone calls for whomever is going to primary Chad Mayes if he doesnt resign his seat, Donnelly said Friday night.

Mayes can be removed from his leadership post, which he has held for two years, only by a vote of his 25-member caucus. That could happen when lawmakers return from their summer recess on Aug. 21. He faces an internal challenge from Assemblyman Jay Obernolte (R-Big Bear) and maybe others.

Jim Brulte, the partys state chairman who held the same leadership post when he served in the Assembly and Senate, gave Mayes some advice: Once these challenges gain steam, theyre hard to stop. Mayes confirmed the conversation; Brulte declined to comment.

Obernolte and Mayes met Friday to talk about caucus leadership, according to sources with knowledge of the conversation, and Mayes left the meeting planning to remain in his position.

The acrimony over cap and trade has also complicated routine negotiations over extending a routine fundraising agreement between the state party and legislative Republicans, threatening an important tool for filling campaign coffers for next years races.

Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press

Gov. Jerry Brown, left, chats with Republican Assemblymen Heath Flora of Ripon, Jordan Cunningham of Templeton and Rocky Chavez of Oceanside on July 17. They were among eight Republicans who voted with Democrats to extend the cap-and-trade program.

Gov. Jerry Brown, left, chats with Republican Assemblymen Heath Flora of Ripon, Jordan Cunningham of Templeton and Rocky Chavez of Oceanside on July 17. They were among eight Republicans who voted with Democrats to extend the cap-and-trade program. (Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press)

Although Mayes has been the focus of criticism, some of the seven other Republicans who voted for the legislation have been under fire as well. Right-wing activists entered the district office of Assemblyman Marc Steinorth (R-Rancho Cucamonga) and didnt leave until the California Highway Patrol arrived. Assemblyman Devon Mathis (R-Visalia), who drew attention for his emotional speech before the vote explaining his support for cap and trade, faced angry comments from constituents during a town hall meeting last month.

The internal disputes could cast last months vote to extend cap and trade in a much different light. The bipartisan deal had been hailed by supporters as opening a new chapter in Californias environmental leadership, one that could enjoy broader support than in the past. Former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the rare Republican who has championed the fight against global warming, said his party had moved forward in a big step.

But the harsh criticisms could force lawmakers back into their partisan foxholes when it comes to climate change.

Chris Megerian and Joe Fox

Here's how California's complex cap-and-trade program operates and how the state's policies are changing under new legislation.

Here's how California's complex cap-and-trade program operates and how the state's policies are changing under new legislation. (Chris Megerian and Joe Fox)

Its a familiar cycle for Californias beleaguered Republicans. Trapped in a shrinking legislative and electoral minority, their only shots at relevance have come through working with Democrats. That often leads to recriminations when Republicans cross party lines to support proposals that dont fit conservative orthodoxy.

There is historically a tension between being relevant as the minority party, and achieving success on the margins as opposed to being 100% doctrinaire, said Rob Stutzman, a former Schwarzenegger advisor.

The bitterness in the Capitol deepened last week when Assemblywoman Melissa Melendez (R-Lake Elsinore), who stepped down as Mayes deputy caucus leader last month to protest his handling of cap and trade, was booted out of her third-floor office. With one days notice, she was moved into a cramped fifth-floor space known as the doghouse, a common landing ground for lawmakers who run afoul of their leaders.

Mayes denied the move had anything to do with disagreements over cap and trade, but it sparked another outcry. Prominent conservative blogger Jon Fleischman said he deserves to lose his legislative seat in addition to his leadership post.

Melanie Mason

A rundown of the political ripple effects of the vote to extend California's landmark climate program, cap-and-trade

A rundown of the political ripple effects of the vote to extend California's landmark climate program, cap-and-trade (Melanie Mason)

Despite the internal furor, the public blowback against Republicans who voted for cap and trade could be limited. Some of the deep-pocketed organizations that usually fund opposition to environmental policies, such as the Western States Petroleum Assn., supported this years legislation.

Mathis was flanked on stage at his recent town hall by business leaders who described his vote as courageous and called the legislation a hell of a deal. Dorothy Rothrock, who supports the legislation as president of the California Manufacturers and Technology Assn., described their presence as a show of force.

The response from the crowd, however, was mixed. One man accused Mathis of having stamped a D at the end of your name. A woman called the assemblyman mindless, spineless Mathis.

But its unclear how deep anger about the cap-and-trade vote runs with voters in the lawmakers districts. Rothrock noted that the town hall was sparsely attended.

There were many more seats than there were people, she said. I was expecting a line out the door.

More than half of Californians said they hadnt heard anything about the 5-year-old cap-and-trade program, according to a recent poll from the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California. But once the program was described to those polled, 56% said they were in favor, including 54% of voters who arent registered with a political party and 32% of Republicans.

Nearly three-quarters of Californians support last years law requiring the state to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 40% below 1990 levels by 2030, according to the same poll.

Given the strong support for the states goals, some Republicans said its better for them to find a way to have a voice on the issue rather than simply opposing every Democratic proposal.

We have to be open-minded to these issues, said Assemblyman Heath Flora (R-Ripon), who also voted for the cap-and-trade legislation. We cant just say, Its a hoax, and move on.

Follow live coverage from the Capitol on Essential Politics

Some Republicans who voted for the legislation have highlighted the concessions they extracted from Democrats in return for their votes. For example, the final deal includes a proposed constitutional amendment that will be on next years ballot. If voters pass it, Republicans would gain greater influence over how the state spends billions of dollars in cap-and-trade revenue.

Getting involved on global warming could pay political dividends, Mayes said, making his members more appealing to a broader swath of voters.

The Republican Party has to change in California, or were going to continue down the spiral were currently in, he said.

His staff has a cartoon in their Capitol office illustrating a corporate boardroom with charts showing plummeting profits and sales. One person in the cartoon pipes up, What if we dont change at all and something magical just happens?

It remains to be seen whether Mayes will follow in the footsteps of previous top Republicans by facing political consequences for controversial votes. The most notable example in recent years was when Dave Cogdill, the late Republican state Senate leader, joined with Democrats and Schwarzenegger to support temporary taxes during Californias financial crisis in 2009.

His caucus called a late-night meeting where he was stripped of his leadership position.

Mayes has hung onto his post so far, heading off a coup attempt shortly after the cap-and-trade vote. But he knows another challenge is possible.

I serve at the pleasure of our caucus, he said. As I know of today, the majority of people in my caucus want me to continue to be the leader. That could change in minutes.

chris.megerian@latimes.com

Twitter: @chrismegerian

seema.mehta@latimes.com

Twitter: @LATSeema

Times staff writer Phil Willon contributed to this report from Fresno.

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Updates on California politics

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California Republicans face backlash for backing climate change program - Los Angeles Times

Ronna Romney McDaniel, chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, came to Detroit Monday to try and reach out and and attract African-American voters to the GOP. Wochit

Michigan Republican Party chairman Ron Weiser and Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel came to Detroit Monday to reach out to African American voters(Photo: Kathleen Gray/Detroit Free Press)Buy Photo

The timing couldn't have been more awkward.

Ronna Romney McDaniel, chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, came to Detroit on Monday to try toreach out and and attract African-American voters to the GOP.

But her visit came 48 hours after a violent and deadly weekend of rioting in Charlottesville, Va., where white supremacists and neo-Nazis gathered to protest the removal of a statute of Confederate Gen.Robert E. Lee.

More: Groups rally in Detroit, Ann Arbor after deadly Virginia protest

Their confrontations with protesters of their movement culminated with an Ohio man driving his car through a crowd of protesters, killing a woman and injuring 34 others.

Unlike many politicians in both the Republican and Democratic parties who condemned the violence and the white supremacists who sparked it, President Donald Trump denounced the violence from "many sides" and refused to call out the white nationalists by name.

Trump was widely criticized for his lack of a more forceful denunciation of the instigators.

More: Ex-Michigan Congressman John Dingell's response to Charlottesville goes viral

So when Romney McDaniel stepped into a state Republican Party office in Detroit, she forcefully renounced the actions of the weekend, but declined to criticize Trump.

"As chairman of the Republican Party, I want to be perfectly clear that white supremacy, neo-Nazis, theKKK,hate speech and bigotry arenot welcome and does not have a home in the Republican Party," she said during a meeting with about two dozen African-American voters.

She added that Trump'scomments on Saturday showthat "hate is unacceptable, bigotry is unacceptable. That defines whatwhite supremacy stands for. And today hell address those in a more specific way now that we know more of what happened on the ground."

Later Monday, Trump was more forceful, saying, "Racism is evil. And those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including the KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists and other hate groups that are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans."

Plenty of people werent convinced of the sincerity of Trumps comments Monday.

U.S. Rep. Dan Kildee, D-Flint Township, tweeted: The President of the United States should not have to be publicly shamed into condemning neo-Nazis and white supremacists.

Also read:

President Trump condemns white supremacists after Charlottesville violence

Michigan Republican Party Chairman Ron Weiser echoed Romney McDaniel's comments about Charlottesville, saying, "Extremists who inciteviolence do not speak for me nor do they speak for the Michigan Republican Party. Together we can fight against racism and hatred. If we do that, we honor the best part of America."

He added a quote from civil rights icon Dr. MartinLuther King Jr.: "I've decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear."

Gov. Rick Snyder also weighed in on the violence,saying,"History has shown time and again that hate begets hate and violence begets violence. On the other hand, unity and cooperation have shown how much we can accomplish when we respect our neighbors, embrace our differences and focus our energy on how we can all move forward and prosper together. Hate speech and violence are not welcome in Michigan."

If Romney McDaniel and Weiser came to Detroit looking for votes, the national and state Republican parties will have an uphill climb. Their main weakness in Michigan lies in Wayne and Oakland counties,where Democrats have been making gains over the last decade. And in Detroit, Hillary Clinton swamped Trump by a 95-3% margin in last year's election.

The two party leaders said the lopsided political environment in the state won't deter them.

"I measure success in more ways than just 95-3," Romney McDaniel said. "It's coming into a room as a Republican and saying how have we engaged in your community and how have welistened and how have we expanded our footprint. That's what the Michigan Republican Party has done. It's more about building relationshipsand showing up in communities that haven't seen Republicans here for far too long."

Weiser told the group, "If you give us a chance, we're going to give you a choice. For far too long, Democrats have taken urban centers for granted and truthfully, Republicansare not reaching out to the extent that we should. We're trying to change that."

While Weiser and Romney McDaniel allowed reporters in for a few questions and their opening remarks, they shooed the media out of the meeting when discussions with the African-American voters began.

Contact Kathleen Gray: 313-223-4430 or kgray99@freepress.com

President Donald Trump said Saturday there was "no place" in the United States for the kind of violence that broke out at a white nationalist rally in Virginia and appealed to Americans to "come together as one." (Aug. 12) AP

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Republicans try to win over African-American voters in Detroit - Detroit Free Press

Pennsylvania sends too many Republicans to Washington.

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Thats not a partisan attack. Its just math.

Of the 18 Pennsylvanian members of the House of Representatives, 13 are Republicans and 5 are Democrats. That split should be more like 11 to 7 or even 10 to 8 if the districts were drawn without attempts at favoring Republicans, according to recent expert analyses.

Its all about the map: Several lawsuits are attempting to get various state legislative and congressional maps declared unconstitutional on the basis of partisan gerrymandering, the idea that one political party drew the lines in a way that benefited them unfairly.

The lawsuits rely on a set of tools that for the first time could convincingly identify skewed maps and persuade the courts that a states map goes too far in favoring one party. A federal court has ruled Wisconsins state legislative map unconstitutional, the first victory in a partisan gerrymandering case in three decades.

That decision used one of several new mathematical tests to help measure the maps Republican skew, and the Supreme Court will hear the case in the fall; if it upholds the decision, it could create a legal standard, potentially including some of these tests for measuring map bias.

That could spell trouble for Pennsylvania, which fails those analyses.

People have made these claims before, but proof has been elusive. The Supreme Court had said too much gerrymandering could be unconstitutional, but the justices couldnt agree on how much is too much in part for lack of measurement standards.

Anthony Kennedy, the pivotal swing vote in the 2004 Pennsylvania case, laid down a gauntlet: A convincing test hadnt been found, but that didnt make it an impossibility. That opinion and how close the court came to declaring partisan gerrymandering a political issue off-limits to the courts spurred academics and lawyers to put forward a host of mathematical methods to precisely identify skewed maps.

No matter what concept you care about in partisan gerrymandering, Pennsylvania is going to be an outlier, said Eric McGhee, a research fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California who helped develop the efficiency gap test.

Unlike in many other states, Pennsylvanias congressional district map is drawn by the state legislature, passed as a bill, and signed by the governor. The current map was drawn in 2011 by Republicans, who controlled both houses of the legislature and the governors mansion. New Jersey, which uses a commission of political appointees, has a bipartisan split and tiebreaker vote; its map is generally not flagged as a problem by these tests.

The 435 seats in the House of Representatives are divvied up after the census every 10 years, based on population. As populations shift across the country, so, too, does political power Pennsylvania has lost at least one seat every 10 years, while states in the Southwest have grown. Once the state is given its number of representatives, it redraws its map.

Those mapping decisions ultimately can shape government policies that affect millions of Americans.

Pennsylvania is clearly quite extreme. This is not random, said Michael Li, a redistricting and voting rights expert who is senior counsel for the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law.

According to tests run by Li and others, the 2011 redrawing of Pennsylvanias congressional districts skewed the districts in Republicans favor, giving two or even three seats to Republicans over what would occur with a politically neutral map.

Here is a summary of how Pennsylvania fares in three of the tests that experts believe best capture evidence of gerrymandering.

The primary gerrymandering methods are packing and cracking.

In packing, a rival partys voters are concentrated in a district it usually wins easily. While that districts race is conceded, the rivals voters cant cast ballots in elections that would be more contested. Cracking involves dispersing a partys voters into multiple districts in such ways that they are deprived of majorities.

In the parlance of what analysts call the efficiency gap, certain votes are wasted, defined as ballots cast either for sure losers, or for the victors above and beyond the winning margins.

Using 2016 election results, Pennsylvania has fared poorly in several efficiency gap analyses, including those by the Associated Press, the Brennan Center, and Philadelphia-based mapping firm Azavea.

By their measures, the Keystone State should be sending 10 Republicans and 8 Democrats to the House not 13 and 5.

Princeton University researchers use very well-known and very well-tested, battle-tested statistical tests to measure ways that mapping can affect elections, said Brian Remlinger, the statistical research assistant who serves as the main analyst at the Princeton Gerrymandering Project.

Cracking and packing would result in one partys winning districts with wide margins, while the other party wins more districts, but with slimmer margins. That effect was evident in Pennsylvania in 2016, when winning Democrats on average took 75 percent of the vote, compared with 64 for Republicans. The odds of that happening would have been less than 0.03 percent with a politically neutral map, Remlinger said.

Historically, what percentage of votes did a party receive in Pennsylvania, how many seats did it win, and how does that compare to recent elections?

Pennsylvanias map is the most heavily skewed in the country on this measure, a Brennan Center analysis found. In 2016, Republicans had about a four-seat advantage, compared with the outcomes in a neutral mapping, and about five seats in 2012.

There isnt necessarily a need to pick one test, you can have multiple tests and the fact that multiple tests point in the same direction, as in Pennsylvania, suggest this isnt random, Li said.

The Supreme Court will hear arguments this fall in Gill v. Whitford, the Wisconsin case in which a three-judge panel relied on the efficiency gap, in part, to declare Wisconsins state legislative map unconstitutional.

If the Supreme Court upholds that decision, using the efficiency gap or other measures, that in effect would green-light the use of these measures in gerrymandering case law, experts said, and open the door for other maps to get challenged using these tests.

All of these things tend to point in the same direction, so we think that presenting any of these pieces of evidence could be useful for a court, said Ruth Greenwood, senior legal counsel at the Campaign Legal Center, which is bringing the Whitford case before the Supreme Court.

Pennsylvanias map is already facing a direct challenge: The League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania in June sued the state, using the efficiency gap as part of its legal argument that partisan gerrymandering had occurred.

An election system in which one party, whatever party happens to be in control of the election system, can rig it so it can win and keep a majority thereafter, is almost by definition the antithesis of self-government, said Michael Churchill, an attorney at Philadelphia-based Public Interest Law Center, which is representing the League in the case.

It defeats the very purpose of having elections.

Gerrymandering is an age-old process of dividing congressional and legislative districts in such a way as to give one party an advantage.

On Feb. 11, 1812, Gov. Elbridge Gerry, then the governor of Massachusetts, signed into law a redistricting plan aimed at keep his party in power.

The Boston Gazette printed mock map in the shape of a salamander under the headline The Gerry-mander.

The rest is history.

Could Pa. courts do what lawmakers won't? Jun 25 - 11:19 PM

Groups sue Pa. over congressional district gerrymandering Jun 15 - 8:39 PM

Supreme Court to hear potentially landmark case on partisan gerrymandering Jun 20 - 1:07 AM

GOP quietly carved key districts in its favor Oct 23 - 1:08 AM

Published: August 14, 2017 8:00 AM EDT | Updated: August 14, 2017 8:37 AM EDT

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Why Pa. sends too many Republicans to Congress - and why that could change - Philly.com

White nationalists carry torches on the grounds of the University of Virginia on Friday. STRINGER / Reuters

To be sure, many of these areas are extremely hostile to minorities, or outsiders, but while there may be a culture manifested in isolation and poverty among poor whites, racist institutions cannot exist on their power alone. They have neither the money nor the means to fight for oppressive voter registration laws, gerrymandered voting districts, or corporate-friendly tax loopholes that enrich board members who in turn use that money to lobby Congress for even more corporate welfare.

Poor whites, no more than poor blacks or Latinos, are not more likely to find Iraq on a map than they are any number of countries to which we send our soldier youngsters to secure access to whatever resource Congress has deemed a national interest; sugar, bananas, oil, whatever.

Poor whites probably couldnt tell you that the United States spends almost as much money on military power than the rest of the world does combined. The words

And yet, when we think of white supremacy we think of these poor whites. We do not think of our history and the fact that institutions like the police have been infiltrated by white supremacists; we still see how minorities are treated as the enemy. You are as likely to find illegal drugs in wealthy Scottsdale, Arizona or in a fraternity than you are to find it in Compton or East Los Angeles. And yet we see an armada of helicopters flying over the latter and not the former. Poor whites dont make that policy.

We do not think of

We do not think of

Indeed, Cvjetanovic is our future loan officer, or firefighter. A supposed student of history, he may be our kids' high school teacher.

And this is perhaps why the GOP was so quick to condemn these people, not because of who they are, but because of what they reveal about us as a country. Their sin was not to be racist, but to be visible. Promoting obscure policies that have the effect of oppressing minorities is an acceptable American pastime, one can do so while still pretending to advocate for American principles, like liberty, equality, or fairness.

But the GOP's reaction to white supremacy is nothing but a shell game. They created Trump with decades of vilifying immigrants, attacking the black community through coded language about "welfare queens" and being "tough on crime".

RELATED:

They indulged Trump's assault on President Barack Obama's legitimacy as a citizen through his birther sham, a project he took up with former Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio, a

RELATED:

Trump ran on not being "politically correct" and vowed to proclaim "Islamic terrorism" by its name, yet he is a coward when asked to confront Nazis or Vladimir Putin. The GOP is led by this very small man. Tweeting their disapproval when a person was killed and dozens injured in a neo-Nazi rally is not nearly enough.

Writing the training manual for the police which allows them to shoot minorities and almost never face any consequences is racism. The GOP should address that. Who sits on these commissions is often an obscure mystery to poor white folks who could care less, but it matters greatly to the Richard Spencers and Stephen Millers.

Minorities are less likely to

If you don't stand with the white supremacists, stand for changing these facts.

Cvjetanovic and his funny foreign-sounding name, which white supremacists of the past would not have distinguished from Nuo or Chen or Weinstein, is a misguided tool, but like the tools he marched with, he was certainly not oppressed and would not know oppression if he saw it. Indeed, he will be a part of our system of oppression before long, and had he not showed his face, his participation in our racist system would have gone largely unnoticed or unchallenged.

Racism is the laws, the institutions, and the policies which oppress minorities, women, and sexual minorities and gives privileged status to people like Tucker Carlson. They want to keep it that way, so they use their influence, education, and resources to buttress a system of rules that maintain their power. This weekend's rally finally put an accurate face on these institutions.

The question now is whether the GOP will be politically incorrect and call out our racist system.

I'm not holding my breath.

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Opinion: Republicans' Reaction to Racism Is a Shell Game - NBCNews.com

President Trump made two big political decisions over past half-week, and both are already proving disasters.

The first decision was to cut himself loose from the Republican leadership in Congress. Trump blasted Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell with a sequence of tweets fixing blame on McConnelland thereby absolving himselffor the failure of Obamacare repeal.

The second decision was to issue a statement condemning many sides for the confrontation in Charlottesville, Virginia, over the weekendand adhering to that policy of pandering to white nationalism even after the ramming death of a counter-protester and the injury of many more.

Trump had wanted to stand apart from Republicans in Congressand they have now obliged him. Former campaign rivals Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio; Senator Cory Gardner, who heads the Senate Republican campaign organization; President Pro Tempore of the Senate Orrin Hatchall issued statements implicitly criticizing Trumps for its even-handedness between perpetrators and targets.

Its always hazardous to overthink the strategy behind Trumps words or actions. Oftentimes the president simply reacts with impulsive emotionalism to events. Yet there are plausible reasons for him to distance himself from the Senate Republicans now. A president normally needs Congress to enact his agenda. This president, however, does not have much of a legislative agenda. Instead, he has submitted to the policy agenda of Congressand that agenda is, if possible, even less popular than he is. Trump will be far better off going to the nation in 2020 not having removed Medicaid coverage from millions of red state voters, not having shoved through a huge upper-income tax cut financed by stringent domestic budget cuts, than he would be running on that record.

What Trump needs most for 2020 is an excuse, and a plausible enemy. Complaints about Democratic obstruction and partisan Russia witch hunts sound absurd when Republicans control both houses of Congress. Lose even one chamber, however, and suddenly those talking points acquire some plausibility, at least in the ears of Trump-inclined voters. And even if blaming Congress does not reflect a deliberate strategic calculationwith this president, its difficult to conclude that anything doesit could be regarded as working to his advantage. The Trump base is much more clearly defined by its cultural resentments than by any policy program: sacrificing the program to enflame the resentments may well appear to the embattled Trump White House as the least bad survival option.

Until Charlottesville.

Trump supporters often invoke the presidents supposed mandate from the people. Heres what Kellyanne Conway told Andrea Mitchell just last weekend:

Republican consultants ... totally missed what was happening in America. That the forgotten man and forgotten woman, many of whom had voted for Democrats in the past, many of whom had never voted, or never voted in decade, came forth and made this new Trump coalition in a way thatin a way that frankly, respectfully, the last couple of Republican candidates did not.

Trump aides say such things so often that they themselves may have lost sight of how untrue they are. Trump not only lost the popular vote in 2016, but he won a smaller share than Mitt Romney in 2012, and only 0.3 percent more than John McCain in the disastrous year 2008. (The tallies stand at 45.93 percent for Trump vs. 45.6% percent for McCain) With barely one-third of the U.S. public approving his presidency in the last pre-Charlottesville polls, Trumps presidency has sunk to the lowest level of popularity ever recorded in a presidents first year.

The Trump team may be trying to replay Bill Clintons triangulation of 1995-96, when Clinton won re-election by positioning himself as a moderate centrist between the extremes of the congressional Republicans and congressional Democrats. And maybe Trump could have executed a blue-collar version of that strategy by joining cultural conservatism to a free-spending populism of infrastructure spending and the defense of Medicare and Medicaid. Instead hes positioned himself in such a way that other political actors can triangulate against him: congressional Republicans, by rejecting Trumps indulgence of murderous racism; congressional Democrats, by fastening Trump to the widely disliked Ryan-McConnell policy agenda.

Its probably impossible for a man of Trumps psychology to process how much legal jeopardy he and his family may be inand how utterly he depends on Republicans in Congress to shield him. President Bill Clinton faced down scandal politics in his second term because his party united to support him, a decision politically vindicated by the strong Democratic showing in 1998, the best sixth-year election performance in modern history. Trump, by contrast, is doing his utmost to persuade congressional Republicans that it could well be less disastrous to face the voters in 2020 under Mike Pence than Donald Trump. Pence apparently thinks so, too. Pre-Charlottesville, that remained a tough sale. Post-Charlottesville, things look different.

Trump now stands not between the parties, or above the parties, but beyond the partiesin some strange political twilight zone where neo-Nazis are seen as a constituency not to be insulted. As events shift Trump to that bizarre place, even his one authentic achievement as presidentthe steep reduction in illegal immigrationrisks becoming an anti-achievement. Trump and his white-nationalist advisers seem determined to corroborate their critics accusation that enforcement is concerned not with protecting the wages and working conditions of legal residents of the United Statespart of a pro-worker agenda that also could include a big investment in construction, trust-busting of college tuition, and a defense of existing social-insurance programs but instead as a component of a white-nationalist agenda that also includes attacks on minority voting rights, a rollback of affirmative action, and compliments to authoritarian leaders worldwide.

The conventional wisdom is that dissension is a party killer; safer to stay united around even a low-polling president than to act against him. But what if it is the president who is fomenting the dissension, because his ego requires that every failure be blamed on somebody else? What if the president is polling so low that he splashes his party with his own odium? What if he is branding his entirely flag-waving party with the flags not of the United States but of Russia, the Southern Confederacy, and now amazingly even Nazi Germany? Then, to quote the Moby Dick at Sea" account that seems at every turn to be subtweeting this presidency:

Now, in general, Stick to the boat, is your true motto in whaling; but cases will sometimes happen when Leap from the boat, is still better.

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Time for Republicans to Leap From the Boat - The Atlantic