Non-endorsements of Trump within the GOP could be the start of a historic event

WASHINGTON DC, – Some of the Republican party’s most prominent members have resisted endorsing Donald Trump amid a historic, soul-searching exercise over their presidential nominee.

The party’s two living ex-presidents — the George Bushes — won’t endorse him. Neither will the last nominee, Mitt Romney. At least two senators are looking to back a third-party candidate.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, the top Republican in Congress, says he’s not ready yet. He has two months to decide. Because it so happens that he is also chairman of the summer convention that will formally nominate Trump.

The majority of the party establishment appears willing to support the nominee. That being said, several lawmakers have avoided mentioning his name, while insisting they’ll focus more on congressional races.

Others have said more explicitly they want no association with Trump, who is detested by Latinos, the country’s fastest-growing ethnic group; an advocate of banning Muslims from entering the country; and an occasional proponent of anti-conservative positions on everything from social issues to taxes.

“I am a conservative,” said Aaron Gardner, an army veteran and communications consultant from Colorado.

“I can no more vote for Trump than I can vote for his good friend Hillary. Both are progressives, though they may disagree on some means, their aims are the same — less individual self-control and more government control of the individual.”

He’s changing his party registration to Libertarian, or Unaffiliated.

A senior fellow at the New America Foundation has a theory that this debate is an early whisper of a historic event: the realignment of America’s political parties.

In a few years, Lee Drutman predicted, former Bernie Sanders supporters and former Donald Trump supporters will belong to the same political party — a Republican party based on nationalism and economic populism.

He expects the Clinton types will win a party struggle with the more socialist left, and eventually be joined by Bush types in a cosmopolitan, pro-business Democratic party.

“The Republicans are cracking up,” Drutman said in an interview. “And I think Democrats are also going to split as well.”

During that breakup process, there will be more co-operation between parties in Congress, with more bills passed, compared to the current gridlock, he added.

That’s what happened the last time the parties reshuffled their membership, a process accelerated by civil-rights debates but which actually took decades. Members would often have more in common with the other party than their own, and they co-operated to pass lots more bills.

The next realignment would be the seventh in American history, he said, and the first since the Reagan era.

Meanwhile, Republicans are figuring out what to do in 2016.

The grassroots falls into three categories, one activist said, including party loyalists who’ll back Trump because he’s the nominee, and people who will reluctantly vote for Trump to avoid allowing Democrats to control Supreme Court picks.

The third category is those backing a third-party candidate — like Gary Johnson, former governor of New Mexico now atop the Libertarian party ticket.

Conservative writer Laura Carno, while wrestling with what to do about the presidency, said she will instead “focus on down-ticket (legislative) races that will… (provide a) check and balance on the presidency.”

Most Republicans in Washington have expressed muted support for Trump. But one senator typed out an anti-Trump manifesto and posted it to Facebook.

Ben Sasse is one of the most conservative members of the chamber. The rookie Nebraska lawmaker says he’ll seek another candidate to back — aside from Democrat Hillary Clinton.

“I was not born Republican. I chose this party, for as long as it is useful,” he wrote. “I can’t support Donald Trump.”

Some former rivals are coming around. Bobby Jindal, the ex-governor of Louisiana who was one of the first adversaries to be squeezed out of the race by Trump, said he still has concerns about him: “But I think he’s better than Hillary Clinton,” he told Fox News.

At least there’s a chance he’ll nominate a conservative to the Supreme Court, unlike Clinton, he said. Same with repealing President Barack Obama’s health law — he might do it, Clinton won’t.

Romney’s top strategist in the last election, Stuart Stevens, told Fox on the night Trump became the presumptive nominee: “I can’t, in good conscience, back someone I feel is uniquely unqualified to be president of the United States…

“It’s something you’re going to have to live with, for all time.”

Top Stories

Top Stories

Most Watched Today