Long before the former president announced his campaign to retake the White House, he launched a quieter campaign to rack up Republican endorsements, says The Associated Press.
In early 2021, after Trump lost to Democrat Joe Biden and inspired a mob of supporters to attack the Capitol trying to overturn the 2020 election, the defeated president started laying the groundwork for the support in Congress he'd need.
With three-hour dinners at his private clubs, phone town-hall fundraisers, rides on his private jet and endorsements of his own up and down the ballot, Trump "schmoozed and strategized and wined-and-dined his way to the GOP lawmakers’ support,” says AP.
By the time of the caucus in Iowa this month, Trump had secured endorsements from 120 House Republicans and nearly half the Republicans in the Senate. And after Trump won the New Hampshire primary, the number of endorsements climbed higher, with a solid majority of Republicans in both chambers of Congress — "almost ensuring Trump has no institutional roadblocks to the eventual party nomination and a potential return to power,” AP says.
"What becomes glaring now are the hold-outs, most notably Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, and a few top Republican senators, who appear deeply wary of Trump's return and have yet to give him the nod,” says AP.
"While McConnell has signaled he would support the eventual Republican nominee, the same comment the second-ranking Republican Sen. John Thune of South Dakota made Wednesday to reporters at the Capitol, that's usually not good enough for Trump,” AP says.
"For Trump, a supportive nod is not sufficient. He wants a full-throated endorsement,” says AP. "The 'Big E,' as some have said he calls it.”
Experts have said that "democracies that face threats like Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election have a better chance at survival when the political parties stand up for the results of free and fair elections — rather than fuel false conspiracy theories of fraud, as Trump and allies in Congress, have done,” notes AP.
Yes, and as you and I have learned from other reporting over the years, elected officials fear Trump. They need his supporters in order to win their own elections, and his and those supporters’ retribution can be brutal.
As Sen. Mitt Romney has said, some lawmakers who wanted to vote for Trump’s impeachment after Jan. 6 told him they feared for their own and their families’ safety if they did so.
"As dismayed as Romney was by this line of thinking, he understood it. Most members of Congress don’t have security details. Their addresses are publicly available online. Romney himself had been shelling out $5,000 a day since the riot to cover private security for his family — an expense he knew most of his colleagues couldn’t afford,” says an excerpt from his biography, "Romney: A Reckoning,” in The Atlantic.
Here is a list of Trump endorsements from House members, senators and governors as of Jan. 23, from The Hill.
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