{"id":3620,"date":"2026-07-20T16:40:55","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T16:40:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=3620"},"modified":"2026-07-20T16:40:55","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T16:40:55","slug":"weaponized-against-his-own-party-republicans-panic-over-trumps-mess","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=3620","title":{"rendered":"‘Weaponized against his own party’: Republicans panic over Trump\u2019s ‘mess’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

As President Donald Trump<\/u> ramps up his 2020 election denial rhetoric, panic is growing among Republicans who fear he has \u201cweaponized” his latest legislative priority “against his own party.”<\/p>\n

Read more Fox News analyst exposes how Trump made things much worse than \u2018two years ago\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n

According to the Washington Post, a turning point came last week with Trump\u2019s prime time address, in which he claimed to reveal \u201cshocking\u201d discoveries about foreign election interference. But while he and his usual supporters praised the speech, it \u201cfailed to galvanize conservatives<\/u>, with some publicly questioning his focus on 2020 as the midterms approach. Republicans fighting to maintain congressional control this fall largely sidestepped the message.\u201d<\/p>\n

Within a day of the address, even pro-Trump commentators had moved on, and as the Post explains, \u201cThe muted response underscored a broader political reality: Many Republicans facing voters this fall have shown little interest in making Trump\u2019s renewed focus on the 2020 election central to their campaigns as they head into a midterm complicated by the president\u2019s weak standing with independent voters.\u201d Even Fox News<\/u> largely ignored the speech, instead focusing on a GOP senatorial candidate speaking about public safety. <\/p>\n

The \u201cclear and simple\u201d reason most Republican candidates don\u2019t want to talk about the 2020 election is that voters don\u2019t care, said Paul Shumaker, a veteran Republican strategist. As he explained, \u201cIf candidates are not talking about the economy, if candidates are not talking about affordability, if they\u2019re not talking about how they\u2019re going to make people\u2019s lives at home cheaper and less expensive, then they\u2019re not talking about the issues that voters care about.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matthew Bartlett, who was appointed to the State Department in Trump\u2019s first term and is now a Republican public affairs strategist, said Trump\u2019s speech was \u201cmess\u201d that undercut Trump\u2019s effort to push Republicans into passing the Save America Act, \u201cwhich he has oddly weaponized against his own party.\u201d Many Republicans, he said, are happy Trump\u2019s message didn\u2019t break through. The general sentiment after the speech, he said, seems to be, \u201cIf the president makes outrageous claims about an election and no one is listening, did it even happen?\u201d <\/p>\n

Read more Trump busted for bragging about falling prices that have nothing to do with him<\/a><\/p>\n

After the speech, the two Republican senatorial holdouts against the SAVE Act said it did not sway their positions, and Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), who co-sponsored the bill, was similarly unimpressed, saying, \u201cWe have 109 days until the midterm elections, and I don\u2019t understand talking about what happened six years ago in light of these upcoming elections.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to the Post, \u201cThe speech also fell short with Trump\u2019s hard-right supporters who wanted a more aggressive response.\u201d Longtime MAGA figurehead Steve Bannon said he was \u201cdecidedly unimpressed\u201d and didn\u2019t hear \u201cany sense of urgency or any real action plan.\u201d And \u201cprominent right-wing ally Laura Loomer questioned on social media as Trump spoke whether any of the information he was sharing was new.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the Post notes, \u201cTrump\u2019s renewed focus on his 2020 election loss comes as polls continue to register voters\u2019 frustration with his handling of the economy and the Iran war. And while Republicans are not losing by a wide margin on a hypothetical midterm ballot, despite Trump\u2019s deep unpopularity, Republican voters currently aren\u2019t as energized to turn up at the polls[.] Democrats are 10 points more likely to be certain to vote this year than Republicans, compared with their two-point edge in 2018.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more These \u2018high-stakes hearings\u2019 could decide fate of 3 Trump lawsuits<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As President Donald Trump ramps up his 2020 election denial rhetoric, panic is growing among Republicans who fear he has \u201cweaponized” his latest legislative priority “against his own party.”According to the Washington Post, a turning point came last week with Trump\u2019s prime time address, in which he …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3619,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3620","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n'Weaponized against his own party': Republicans panic over Trump\u2019s 'mess' - Next Address America<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=3620\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"'Weaponized against his own party': Republicans panic over Trump\u2019s 'mess' - 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