Credit…Susan Walsh/Associated Press

Dear Commons Community,

David Leonhardt, staff writer for The New York Times had an article on Wednesday describing what he called: “The G.O.P.’s Putin Wing.  He starts with Donald Trump who has admired Putin for years even during the more recent Ukraine invasion.  Leonhardt describes how Trump’s position has trickled down to other Republicans.  Here is an excerpt.

“Donald Trump turned Vladimir Putin into a popular figure among a significant segment of Republican voters. As a candidate, president and ex-president, Trump has repeatedly praised Putin, calling him “strong,” “savvy” and “genius.” Trump has also echoed Putin’s ideology, by harshly criticizing NATO.

Taking their cue from Trump, some Republican voters began to view Putin more favorably. A YouGov poll in January found that Republicans viewed Putin more favorably than they viewed President Biden, Kamala Harris or Nancy Pelosi.

Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has changed the situation, damaging his popularity in the U.S., even among Republicans. If anything, many Republican voters say they wish the Biden administration would take more aggressive action to help Ukraine, according to the Pew Research Center. Yet Trump’s effect on Putin’s popularity has not entirely disappeared: There is still a meaningful faction of Republican elites who feel an affinity for the Russian president.

Representative Liz Cheney, the Wyoming Republican and frequent Trump critic, describes it as “the Putin wing of the G.O.P.” It both admires him as a strong leader and likes his right-wing nationalism, including his opposition to NATO, Western liberalism and L.G.B.T. rights.

For now, this wing remains on the party’s fringe, with little ability to affect policy. Senator Lindsey Graham has called Putin’s defenders “outliers,” while Kevin McCarthy, the Republican leader in the House, has described Putin as an evil dictator who is murdering people.

But the G.O.P.’s Putin wing still has influence. It is affecting coverage by the most important news source for Republicans voters: Fox News. It seems to be shaping the behavior of another major corporation: Koch Industries. And Trump remains a leading contender to win the 2024 Republican nomination, which suggests the party’s Putin-friendly faction may not remain on the fringe.”

The Democrats should try to exploit the Putin fringe of the G.O.P. in the 2022 elections.

Tony

This entry is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.