Any pretense of discomfort with Donald Trump among Republicans in the game is done. The big donors who largely stayed away in 2016—they're all in for 2020. And the elected Republicans who watched their colleagues fall in the 2018 Democratic wave? They're not going to be bothered by anything as mundane as a president obstructing justice to hide his reliance on a foreign adversary in gaining his office. They're standing by their man Individual 1, as he's known in the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York. (Yeah, all that's still out there, too.)
Led by their Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who says, "I think the American people would like to move on from this. […] They've learned quite enough about it," 2020 Senate Republicans are downplaying Trump's deep corruption as some kind of joke. They're clearly counting on House Democrats being too easily played by McConnell into not investigating, not laying Trump's malfeasance bare, and not looking into how deep Russian tentacles extend into the GOP. No. 1 vulnerable Republican Sen. Cory Gardner, from trending-blue Colorado, says, "Look, it's clear there were no merit badges earned at the White House for behavior." Right. Trump's just a bad Boy Scout. "You have to focus on the heart of this conclusion," he continued, "which is there is no collusion, no cooperation." Never mind the orange obstruction elephant and the very odiferous wafts of collusion from the report in which Mueller is begging for congressional investigations. "That's where the focus ought to be and how we prepare for the next elections to protect us from Russian intrusion and interference." (I've got bad news for you on that front, Cory.)
The others in the vulnerable Republican pool are no more anxious to see the import of the Mueller report and its evidence that they're in bed with a monster. Arizona's Martha McSally is "very pissed" that Russians interfered in the election, but won't go further into the part about who benefited from that interference. A deeply concerned Sen. Susan Collins, Maine's less-than-finest, was struck by the "unflattering portrayal of the president," but leaves it at that. Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina had his spokesperson tell Politico that "pursuing the path of endless investigations and impeachment would be a bitterly partisan move that would further divide the country." Funny thing about that: The Mueller report also revealed that Tillis' home state colleague, Richard Burr, used his position as chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence to leak information about the FBI's Trump investigation to ... Trump. Yes, digging more deeply into that might be just a little uncomfortable. And finally, pig-castrater Joni Ernst blows it all off with a "We all know how the president is"—he's "brash."
Brash. Over on the House side, Republicans are looking for silver linings. Rep. Peter King, who should face an increasingly tough race in his New York district, cherry-picks his favorite part: "Is it ideal? Donald Trump is not a saint. Nobody ever said he is. […] But … he never did stop the investigation." He might have tried really, really hard to fire Mueller, but his staff didn't let him, so it's all good. And Rep. Rodney Davis from Illinois is trying on some concern-trolling, refusing to actually address the issue of Trump and instead warning Democrats of doom if they start probing too deeply. "Its sort of Machiavellian, but [impeachment] could help Republicans and the president." Be careful what you wish for, Mr. Davis.
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