OPINION:
It’s safe to say President Donald Trump has his share of detractors and critics.
But what’s so puzzling to the conservatives of America — the ones who don’t party-hearty with politicos in the cesspool of Washington, D.C., that is — are the detractors from within the ranks of Trump’s own GOP.
Why would George Will of conservative column-writing fame, Joe Scarborough of former Republican lawmaking name, and scores of notable GOP heavy-weights part ways with this president, in snarky public fashion, no less, and take up triumphant ties with the Democrats?
The easy answer, of course, is they’re elitists and long-time Republicans-In-Name-Only anyway.
And no doubt, that’s true, at least in most of the cases. But calling for Republicans to vote Democrat just to strip Trump of his power to govern? That’s some kind of hatred — a personal vendetta-type hatred that goes deeper than political dissent.
“It is almost Biblical, like Moses parting the Red Sea, to watch a growing list of prominent conservatives leave the Republican Party entirely, urge voters to back Democrats in the midterm elections, or both,” wrote one opinion columnist with The Hill. “The exodus from the GOP includes lifetime Republican and Washington Post columnist Max Boot, leading Republican campaign advisor Steve Schmidt and Peter Wehner, who former served presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush.”
That’s in addition to Will and Scarborough, the first who in June penned a scathing column in The Washington Post titled “Vote against the GOP this November,” and the second who’s been on an all-courts-press to see Trump booted from office since day one of the new administration.
That’s also in addition to the many others in GOP-ville who’ve been harshly critical of this president, practically to the point of picking any candidate but Trump and Trump types. Mitt Romney did, for instance. He voted for his own wife, not Trump, for president. Shocking. Shocking and illogical.
Republicans are eating their own.
All this, as Trump’s bringing about many of the supposed conservative agendas that had floundered for so long under the previous administration — things like tax reform and better business climates, booming economies and fewer environmental regulations, tighter borders and safer national security policies.
But his detractors can’t get past his Twitter rants — or the “Rocket Man” rhetoric slung Kim Jong-un’s way?
They’re willing to toss the Supreme Court under the bus to bring back the days when they controlled all that went forth on Capitol Hill — to the time when they could trade and barter at will with the Democrats without fear of being busted and shamed by this White House?
It’s beyond time for establishment-minded Republicans to get behind this administration and either show some support or stay silent with all the anti-Trumpism. Waving a Republican hat while stomping a MAGA cap is bad enough.
But doing it while calling for more votes for Democrats is an outright outrage — a betrayal of voters’ trust. And coincidentally, it’s also one of the major reasons conservatives took to Trump so steadfastly in the first place.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley.
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