Trump and the Republican Resistance
Salvador Hernandez reports at Buzzfeed:
Some Republicans are tearing up, burning, and destroying their voter registration cards after Donald Trump was declared the presumptive GOP presidential nominee Tuesday night.
Pictures and videos of the registration cards were shared on social media and at times tweeted directly at Reince Priebus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, after he called for the party to unite under Trump’s campaign.
Instead, some voters responded by literally burning down their ties to the GOP.
Laura Litvan reports at Bloomberg:
On a day when Republicans in Congress would normally be rallying around their new presumptive presidential nominee, there was instead mostly silence or awkward tap-dancing around Donald Trump’s triumph.
Senator Susan Collins of Maine told a home-state radio station on Wednesday that she’s holding out her endorsement until she sees whether the bombastic real estate tycoon can behave like a president. An aide to one of the year’s most vulnerable Republicans, Senator Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, told a local news outlet the senator plans to support the nominee, only to later send a media statement insisting that doesn’t mean that she’s endorsing him.
Senator Dean Heller of Nevada didn’t hide his scorn.
“I vehemently oppose our nominee and some of the comments and issues he brought up during the campaign,” Heller said during an interview with Nevada reporters one day after Ted Cruz suspended his campaign and hours before John Kasich did the same.
“Things that he’s said about women and the Hispanic community across the West.”
Asked whether he would commit to voting for Trump, Heller responded, “No, but what I’m committing to is voting against Hillary Clinton.” He pointed out that voters in Nevada have the option of voting for “none of the above.”
Matt Viser reports at The Boston Globe:
“Hillary is not going to gaffe her way into a nuclear exchange with North Korea. Trump could,” said Fergus Cullen, New Hampshire’s former GOP chairman.
“It’s just going to be carnage,” he added, about this year’s election. “The party has collectively decided to commit political suicide for this cycle.”
Governor Charlie Baker, on the other hand, announced, “I’m not going to vote for Mr. Trump, and I sincerely doubt I’ll be voting for Hillary Clinton either.” [Story, B1.]
“I have concerns about Mr. Trump’s temperament and some of the things he’s said about women and about Muslims and about religious freedom -- I just can’t support,” he told reporters in Jamaica Plain. “At the same time, I do believe Secretary Clinton has a huge believability problem. And this makes this a very difficult election.”
Tessa Berenson reports at Time:
Ben Howe, a contributing editor at conservative website Red State,tweeted before Cruz dropped out, “I am a fiscal conservative and I am a social conservative. That will not change. But I will not vote for an egomaniacal authoritarian. Nope.” And then he followed simply with the Clinton campaign’s hashtag: #ImWithHer.
Mike Treiser, a former staffer on Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign, wrote on Facebook: “In the face of bigotry, hatred, violence, and small-mindedness, this time, I’m with her.”
Mark Salter, a former strategist for John McCain, also announced on social media before the Indiana results rolled in that he would support Clinton. “He’s an awful human being,” Salter told TIME of Trump earlier that day. “He appeals to a sliver of the country that mystifies me.”
Julian Hattem reports at The Hill:
Throngs of GOP foreign policy officials remain unwilling to support Donald Trump as the party's presidential nominee, with many of them preparing for a self-imposed exile from presidential politics.
Many veterans of the Mitt Romney’s failed 2012 campaign, who had once hoped to propel a new GOP candidate to victory over likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, are now finding themselves on the outside and already looking ahead to the next presidential race in four years’ time.
“I have no intention of voting for Hillary Clinton, and I have no intention of voting for Donald Trump,” said Daniel Runde, who worked on Romney’s team four years ago.
...
One founder of the John Hay group, former Romney adviser and ex-State and Defense official Eliot Cohen, organized a letter now signed by 121 prominent GOP national security officials promising not to support Trump because he would “act in ways that make America less safe.”
