Anti-Trump Republicans face major challenge in launching third party

Tim Reid, James Oliphant, David Morgan and Joseph Ax A group of former Republican officials considering a new centre-right political party to counter former President Donald Trump’s influence would face steep challenges in shaking up a US political system that has favoured two-party rule throughout its history. Reuters exclusively reported on Wednesday that more than 120 Republicans — including former elected officials, along with former administrators under Trump and former presidents Ronald Reagan, George H W Bush and George W Bush — met virtually on February 5 to discuss forming a third party or a new centre-right faction. Two of the most prominent anti-Trump Republicans in Congress — Rep Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Rep Adam Kinzinger of Illinois — rejected the idea of a breakaway party in statements to Reuters on Thursday. Other Republican critics of Trump expressed similar scepticism — arguing a third party would accomplish little beyond splitting the votes of conservatives and helping Democrats get elected. The resistance to a third party among some of Trump’s toughest Republican critics underscores the extreme difficulty of such a political revolt. Such an effort would require walking away from the Republican Party’s massive political infrastructure — staff, money, connections and data on donors and voters — that would take years if not decades to build from scratch. An upstart party would also have little chance of succeeding without a charismatic leader who could capture the loyalties of millions of disaffected voters, said Alex Conant, a Republican strategist who was a senior adviser to the Republican primary campaign of Marco Rubio, a Senator from Florida, in 2016. “If somebody was going to start a third party that was going to gain some traction, it would be Trump” and not his opponents, said Conant. Kinzinger joined the February 5 video conference of the anti-Trump group and spoke for about five minutes, a spokeswoman said. But the congressman wants to “reform the party from within,” she said. He has recently formed a new political action committee to support Republican primary challengers running against pro-Trump House Republicans such as Matt Gaetz, of Florida, and Marjorie Taylor Greene, of Georgia. Cheney said in a statement that she opposes “any effort to split the party,” saying it would only make it easier for Democrats to enact policies that conservatives oppose. Both Cheney and Kinzinger were among just 10 House Republicans, a small minority, who voted to impeach Trump on a charge of inciting the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol. A more likely outcome of an anti-Trump movement would be for centrist Republicans to try to purge Trumpism from within its own ranks, said David Jolly, a former Republican congressman from Florida who recently quit the party in protest of Trump and declared himself an independent. A party of centre-right conservatives could never create a broad enough coalition to win national elections, Jolly said. And Trump has effectively undercut his more moderate opponents among Republican voters, he said, by ridiculing them as “Never Trumpers” and “RINOs” (Republicans in Name Only). “It’s just impossible to escape the ‘never Trump’ label,” he said. Others argue it would be much harder to wrest power over the Republican Party from Trump. “Let’s not kid ourselves; we are not going to change this party,” said Jim Glassman, a former under-secretary of state under George W Bush. Glassman gave a five-minute presentation on the February 5 call advocating for a new party. Any effort to reclaim the party would be “a soul-deadening slog,” he told participants. He said on Thursday that he sees the Republican Party as now thoroughly in thrall to Trump — and beyond repair. “I thought, if Trump lost by 7 million votes, there may have been a chance to do that,” he said in an interview. “But events since the election have made clear that’s not going to happen.” Asked on Wednesday about the discussions for a third party, Jason Miller, a Trump spokesman, said: “These losers left the Republican Party when they voted for Joe Biden.” Glassman believes there are enough Republican donors who are disgusted with Trump and willing to finance a new party. He believes a new conservative party could also attract maybe one fifth of Republican voters who disapprove of Trump, along with some independents and Democrats. — Reuters