- Veteran Republican Congressman Tom Cole warned that the Republican Party faces a crisis worse than after Watergate.
- A gap has opened up between Republican lawmakers who want Trump’s legacy wiped out and grassroots lawmakers and supporters who remain firmly loyal.
- The GOP was able to recover from the scandal that followed the Watergate scandal in the 1970s, but experts say the problems it now faces are somewhat deeper.
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Veteran Republican Congressman Tom Cole of Oklahoma told The New York Times that the crisis facing the Republican Party after Donald Trump’s presidency is greater than that faced after the Watergate scandal.
“I have been professionally in Republican politics for 40 years – so, right after Watergate – and I will say that this was the worst period ever,” Cole told the Times.
His comments come amid chaos at the GOP after Trump left office.
A divide between lawmakers who want to distance Donald Trump’s party after the Capitol revolt and its attempt to subvert the election and a group that has remained firmly loyal to the former president.
Party leaders in Congress, minority leader in the House, Kevin McCarthy, and Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, blamed the violence at Trump’s feet in the wake of the riot. McConnell has signaled that he is open to condemning Trump after the House of Representatives impeached him for his alleged role in inciting the riot.
But last week, they both changed positions, with polls showing that the former president remains very popular with party supporters despite his role in inciting the riot.
In an apparent attempt to fix the relationship, McCarthy visited Trump at his post-White House home, Mar-a-Lago, Florida. After Thursday’s meeting, Trump’s PAC Save America boasted that “the former president’s popularity has never been stronger than it is today, and his endorsement means more than perhaps any endorsement at any time.”
McConnell withdrew from his pro-impeachment position, voting last week in the Senate to reject impeachment, as the prospect of Trump being convicted in his impeachment trial dwindles.
Adding to the crisis that Republicans face, Trump signaled the prospect of forming a third party, the Patriot Party, a move that would likely split the Republican vote, making it virtually impossible to win back Congress in the mid-2022 term.
The consequences of the 1972 Watergate invasion are widely considered to be the biggest political scandal in recent US history, with Republican President Richard Nixon resigning in 1974 when his role in the crime was exposed.
The party was able to recover quickly from Nixon’s scandals, with Gerald Ford taking over as president for the remainder of Nixon’s term and the party regaining power in 1980 after Democrat Jimmy Carter was elected president.
Writing in New York magazine, political analyst Ed Kilgore identified several important differences that would make it more difficult for the Republican Party to recover from Trump’s scandals than Nixon’s, including its enduring popularity and the lack of alternative leaders.