You could see Arizona Governor Doug Ducey occupying the strategic high ground in the battle for the soul of the Republican Party when he went on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, refusing to bite the bullet: Would he have a new Donald? Trump run for president.
Ducey protested and then all the right people attacked him in this battle within the party.
Namely the people outside the party.
The Liberals.
One by one they piled up their contempt.
“What does it say about the state of the Republican cult that Doug Ducey would support an insurgent, agitator and traitor for president?” tweeted Norm Ornsteinleftist political scientist.
Arizona Governor Doug Ducey does not rule out supporting Trump in 2024 (despite Trump calling him ‘one of the worst governors in America’) tweeted progressive journalist Aaron Rupar.
“It is both embarrassing and frightening how Republican politicians like Doug Ducey have been bullied into submission by a fascist demagogue. What a stain on our nation,” tweeted Mark Jacob, former subway editor of the Chicago Tribune.
If minds are cheap, this was the dollar store. You wouldn’t need to know much about Arizona and Republican Party politics to deduce that.
It tells you what Ducey’s tactics are ultimately all about: defeating the Democratic Party and its liberal supporters.
The 3 Camps of the Republican Party After Trump
After the meteor known as Donald Trump hit the Republican Party in 2015, the party split into three different camps.
There was the All-In faction who remained loyal to Trump even after his frenzied attempt to undo the last election, his instigations of the Jan. 6 Capitol uprising, his two impeachments, and his loss in the 2020 election. would support Trump even if he stood in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shot them.
Next up was the #NeverTrump faction that wants to destroy the party to save it.
And finally, there was the Finesse Trump faction that recognizes that the GOP must move beyond Trump without handing over the next decade of elections to the progressive left. This wing understands that you cannot destroy the party to save it because the Democrats would be happy to help you.
The GOP camp that Trump would refine and move forward was well represented by Ducey on Sunday. He told the nation that Kari Lake, the Republican who has Trump’s backing and is leading the polls to replace Ducey, is a con man.
She projects that she’s all in, that she’d take a 5th-Avenue bullet from Trump and still polish his boots. And maybe that’s true, because the two are the same shape-shifters in many ways. Back when Trump lowered Hillary Clinton’s checks; Lake lowered checks for Barack Obama.
Ducey told CNN he’s not focused on the 2024 election and so wouldn’t support anyone in that race, but he noted — and this was telling, you liberal pundits — that there are alternatives.
Ducey is part of a strong bank of GOP governors
Among them is a strong bank of incumbent and former Republican governors such as Florida’s Ron DeSantis, Indiana’s Mike Pence, Georgia’s Brian Kemp, Virginia’s Glenn Youngkin, and even Arizona’s Doug Ducey.
DeSantis is the big dog threatening to replace Trump, all the while ignoring his disdain and insults. The only evidence you need to know that DeSantis poses a serious threat to Democrats is the constant fire he gets from liberal national media and politicians like California Governor Gavin Newsom, who attacked him with a Fourth of July assault ad.
Florida Democrats know DeSantis is a problem. He has collected a $130.4 million campaign chest in his run for reelection, longtime Florida political journalist Marc Caputo reported on Friday. “We’ve never seen that in Florida. Has a candidate in another state ever had that much in the bank?”
At their three-day convention in Tampa last weekend, Florida Democrats ate it and joked about Republicans, Politico reported.
Privately, however, there has been a sense of fatalism among the state Democrats, who are heading into the midterms of 2022 with an unpopular president, the highest inflation rate in 40 years and incumbent officials like Republican administration Ron DeSantis raking in millions and seeming unstoppable. .
Adding to their problems is the lack of national donor groups that have limited how much they are willing to give to candidates after Democrats suffered multiple defeats in recent election cycles. “Nobody’s coming to save us,” State Representative Fentrice Driskell (D-Tampa), the incoming Democratic House leader, said during a Saturday morning session held by Florida Black Democrats.
Democrats really want to fight against Trump
On a national level, Democrats have funded extreme conservatives in the Republican primaries in the hope that they will be defeated by the Democrats in the general election.
Democrats would like nothing more than for Trump to make it official and soon announce that he is running for president again, Politico reported Friday.
The Capitol Hill news site spoke to more than two dozen Democratic officials who told them that a Trump announcement will be a “positive development for the (Democratic) party, if not a game-changer,” and that Democratic campaigns are already on the move. preparing fundraising pitches in hopes of generating millions of dollars from a Trump launch.
“It’s bad for[the Republicans]because he’s taking so much oxygen out of the room,” John Anzalone, a longtime Biden pollster, told Politico. “More people are saying that (Trump) should be charged with a felony. Individual things about his actions and comments have come out. All those things hurt him. In general, he will want to be up front and that is not good for the Republicans because the public is against him.
“So come on in,” Anzalone urged. “Jump in the pool.”
If Republicans elect Kari Lake to run in the general election, Arizona Democrats will be popping corks. She has spent much of her campaign attacking fellow Republicans, accusing Fox News of mistreating her, tarnishing John McCain’s legacy and suggesting that her fellow Republicans might try to rig the primaries against her. .
If Ducey is against that, if he doesn’t want to serve up Donald Trump’s next clay pigeon to shoot the Democrats out of the blue, is it any wonder the liberal pundits are angry?
Phil Boas is an editorial columnist for The Arizona Republic. Email him at [email protected].
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: The Reason Democrats Are Furious With Ducey Over Trump Isn’t What You Think
