Nuanced statements reflect the party establishment\u2019s delicate dance<\/b>
\nNew York \u2014 One after another, the nation\u2019s most powerful Republicans responded to President Donald Trump\u2019s extraordinary remarks about white supremacists. Yet few mentioned the president.
The Senate\u2019s top Republican, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, condemned \u201chate and bigotry.\u201d House Speaker Paul Ryan charged that, \u201cWhite supremacy is repulsive.\u201d Neither criticized the president\u2019s insistence that there were \u201cvery fine people on both sides\u201d of a violent weekend clash between white supremacists and counterdemonstrators.
The nuanced statements reflect the party establishment\u2019s delicate dance. Few top Republican officeholders defended the president in the midst of an escalating political crisis. Yet they are unwilling to declare all-out war against Trump and risk alienating his loyalists. And as the 2018 elections begin to take shape, the debate over Trump\u2019s words appears to be taking hold in GOP primaries.
Trump on Thursday attacked some of the Republicans who have directly criticized him.
South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, who doesn\u2019 t face re-election until 2020, said the president \u201ctook a step backward by again suggesting there is moral equivalency between the white supremacist neo-Nazis and KKK members who attended the Charlottesville rally\u201d and the people demonstrating against them.
\u201cMany Republicans do not agree with and will fight back against the idea that the party of Lincoln has a welcome mat out for the David Dukes of the world, \u201d Graham added, referring to the former Ku Klux Klan leader.
Trump shot back on Thursday on Twitter: \u201cPublicity seeking Lindsey Graham falsely stated that I said there is moral equivalency between the KKK, neo-Nazis & white supremacists and people like Ms. Heyer.\u201d He was referring to Heather Heyer, the woman who was killed when she was struck by a car driven into the crowd.
\u201cSuch a disgusting lie, \u201d Trump said of Graham\u2019s remarks. \u201cHe just can\u2019 t forget his election trouncing. The people of South Carolina will remember.\u201d
Trump then touted a primary opponent of GOP Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona, tweeting Flake \u201cis WEAK on borders, crime and a non-factor in Senate. He\u2019s toxic!\u201d
Flake had tweeted on Wednesday, \u201c\u201dWe can\u2019 t claim to be the party of Lincoln if we equivocate in condemning white supremacy.\u201d
Trump\u2019s overall approval rating may be dismal, but a small group of die-hard supporters is expected to play an outsized role in next year\u2019s midterm elections when the Republican control of Congress is at stake. Those supporters are praising the president\u2019s response to the violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, which left one dead and many more wounded.
\u201cYou got racism in both factions, on both sides, \u201d former New Hampshire GOP chair Jack Kimball said. \u201cTrump has zero fault here. None.\u201d
Republican leaders also need the president: They hope to work with him to enact meaningful legislation on infrastructure, taxes and health care to prove to voters their party can govern.
The delicate relationship helps explain Wednesday\u2019s cautious comments from powerful Republicans like McConnell.
\u201cWe all have a responsibility to stand against hate and violence, wherever it raises its evil head, \u201d McConnell said in a statement, noting that white supremacists are planning a rally in his home state of Kentucky.
\u201cTheir messages of hate and bigotry are not welcome in Kentucky and should not be welcome anywhere in America, \u201d he said.
Former Republican Presidents George H. W. and George W. Bush, usually silent on current political developments, released a joint statement that stopped short of criticizing Trump as well.
\u201cAmerica must always reject racial bigotry, anti-Semitism and hatred in all forms, \u201d the Bushes said.
The political tap dance frustrated as least one member of Trump\u2019s diversity council, CEO of the U. S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce Javier Palomarez, who called Trump\u2019s response \u201ca monumental failure in leadership.\u201d
He challenged those who denounced racism in general terms without calling out the president by name.
\u201cThat\u2019s a sign of weakness, and I don\u2019 t think the American people and the Republican Party is going to forget, \u201d said Palomarez, who noted he would remain on Trump\u2019s diversity council \u201cfor now.\u201d
But Trump loyalists on the ground in key states are ready to fight for their leader. And there were signs that the divide between the loyalists and establishment Republicans is already shaping the mid-term political landscape.
\u201cWe\u2019 ve always had these weak skittish so-called Republicans in the D. C. crowd. They\u2019 re always peeing their pants, \u201d said Corey Stewart, a former Trump aide who has already launched a 2018 Senate bid in Virginia.
Many were quick to blame the media for Trump\u2019s struggles.
\u201cIt doesn\u2019 t take a rocket scientist to figure out the liberal media is not a fan of President Trump, \u201d said Trump\u2019s Alabama campaign chairman, Perry Hooper, arguing the Russia investigation is driven by media obsession. He added, \u201cNow they\u2019 re trying to make him some kind of racist. It\u2019s ridiculous. He doesn\u2019 t have a racist bone in his body.\u201d
Nevada Republican Danny Tarkanian, who is challenging Republican Sen. Dean Heller, said those criticizing Trump\u2019s response to the white supremacist rally were \u201csplitting hairs.\u201d
\u201cIt was clear the media went out of their way to find fault with his statement, \u201d Tarkanian said.
Heller, who is considered one of the most endangered Republicans in the nation heading into the 2018 election, posted a simple statement on Twitter late Tuesday that stopped short of criticizing the president: \u201cThere is no defense or justification for evil in the form of white supremacists and Nazis. None, \u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

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