Republicans Are Not Helpless Against Trump

Eric Medlin
4 min readJun 2, 2021

There is still more they could do.

Trump waving from Air Force One. Source: ACLU

The Republican Party is currently realizing that it has not, in fact, gotten rid of Donald Trump as its leader. Over the weekend, numerous outlets reported that several Trump allies had suggested the possibility of a military coup to reinstall Trump as president. The 45th president himself believes there is a chance this may happen. Maggie Haberman reported that Trump thinks he might be able to return to office in August, even though none of his supporters have laid out a legal or reasonable way for this to happen.

Trump’s hold on the party was evident long before Memorial Day weekend. Last week, Senate Republicans blocked an effort to set up a 9/11-style commission to investigate the January storming of the capital by Trump supporters. Earlier in May, their counterparts in the House removed Liz Cheney from her leadership position because of her continued criticisms of Trump. The former president has been at the top of every 2024 presidential contender poll and is still consulted frequently by Republican lawmakers. He is the undisputed head of the party.

Not all Republicans are happy about these developments. Many know that Trump is unqualified and will continue to drag the party down if he remains its leader. But in a democratic system, they argue, Trump has been shown as the most…

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Eric Medlin
Eric Medlin

Written by Eric Medlin

I’m a writer interested in the intersections of history, ideas, and politics. I publish every week. www.twitter.com/medlinwrites