The Koch brothers were not popular vote loser Donald Trump's biggest fans during the election, probably because like the rest of the the world they couldn't see their party actually electing this guy. But they did, so the Kochs have apparently decided to make nice with Trump. And while usually they make Republicans come to them, they hauled themselves to Palm Beach this weekend, for a "chat" at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort.
Three people familiar with the interaction said it occurred when Trump stopped by as the billionaire brothers were eating dinner with conservative media entrepreneur Chris Ruddy, a friend of the president who is a member of Mar-a-Lago and is known to hold court with his guests at the membership-only club. […]
Steve Lombardo, a spokesman for Koch Industries, the international conglomerate owned by David and Charles Koch, said in an email: “David Koch was indeed at Mar-a-Lago last night and did briefly chat with the President.”
While the Koch network does have allies inside the administration—including Vice President Mike Pence and legislative affairs director Marc Short—it is seen as leery of Trump’s stances on a number of issues. Those include trade, as well as his promised infrastructure spending package, and two of the network’s lead groups offered to spend money defending Republicans who voted against Trump’s aborted health care reform push.
Sure, it was just a coincidence that the brothers were there on the same weekend as Trump, that they picked Mar-a-Lago as the place to have a high-priced friendly meal with one of Trump's best friends. Who could have foreseen a meeting between them?
The hatchet is likely being buried. After all, that pledge to support the Freedom Caucus against Trump was like three weeks ago, when Trump was blaming the Freedom Caucus for blowing up Trumpcare. Since then, they've become his best buddies, and Pence has spent his days courting them, trying to cajole Republicans into digging the thing up again, and failing when he was telling moderates and conservatives two different stories about where the White House is.
Now, though, it really seems that Trump has decided his allies are going to be the maniacs that the Kochs have been enabling for the last seven years, so this rapprochement was inevitable. For as long as it lasts, and with Trump, who knows. But where does that leave the rest of the Republican party?