President Donald Trump is planting a bomb that is sure to explode in Republicans’ faces during the midterms as he seeks to get Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche confirmed for the full AG role, according to one long-time GOP pollster.
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Sarah Longwell, publisher of The Bulwark, argued during a new episode of her podcast, “Illegal News with Sarah Longwell,” that confirming Blanche as Attorney General could be difficult because of the Republicans’ narrow majority in the Senate. She added that Blanche’s confirmation may spark a bitter intra-party fight among Republicans over some of the baggage Blanche is bringing.
“The Blanche thing is so egregious,” Longwell said. “It would not surprise me at all if Blanche gets blocked by the Senate confirmation.”
Longwell noted that Republicans can only afford to have four of their own party members vote against Blanche in the confirmation battle. However, there seem to be at least five — and possibly many more — who are willing to vote against Blanche to spite the president.
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Longwell added that Sens. Susan Collins (R-ME), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Thom Tillis (R-NC), John Cornyn (R-TX), and Bill Cassidy (R-LA) seem likely to vote against Blanche because of how the president has treated them.
She also said that there are other Republicans who are vulnerable enough politically that they may be willing to vote against Blanche with just a little pressure.
“The obvious thing to do is to start running ads in these guys’ states, people who are not completely out of their minds or who are vulnerable, because this is the kind of thing Republicans will attack other Republicans over,” Longwell said, noting that the ads would focus on why Blanche was willing to give convicted sex criminal Ghislaine Maxwell a sweetheart deal to move to a low-security facility.
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