President Donald Trump upped the ante in the growing civil war within the Republican Party after the controversial Koch brothers refused to spend money on a GOP candidate in a key Senate race. In a pair of angry tweets Tuesday morning, Trump attacked the "globalist Koch Brothers."
Tim Phillips, a political strategist who is the president of Americans for Prosperity, announced during the final day of the Koch network donor conference in Colorado Springs, Colorado that the organization funded by David H. Koch and Charles Koch will not give money to the Senate candidacy of Rep. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., according to a report by CNN. According to Phillips, Cramer will not receive Americans for Prosperity's support because "he’s not leading on the issues where this country needs leadership the most right now." Phillips also added that "if this were 2016, we likely would have gone ahead and endorsed him. But we’re raising the bar."
One of the key issues being discussed by the Kochs through Phillips is free trade. One of Americans for Prosperity's leaders said on Sunday that it would consider backing Democratic candidates who share their policy goals, and the group has already made it clear that they plan on spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to oppose Trump's protectionist trade policies, according to CNBC.
This decision could have major ramifications for the North Dakota Senate race. Cramer was widely regarded by many political experts as the candidate most likely to oust Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, a Democrat, from her seat representing North Dakota in the Senate; indeed, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell urged Cramer to run precisely because of his perceived strength. Yet although Heitkamp was rendered vulnerable by the fact that North Dakota voted for Trump over Clinton by more than 30 percentage points, she has also had a strong fundraising edge facilitated by the fact that she has been more conservative than most other Democrats on key issues.
As CNBC reported:
The most recent federal election commission records show Heitkamp raised $1.1 million between May 24 and June 30. Cramer, meanwhile, raised approximately $833,000. Heitkamp's campaign has just over $5.2 million; Cramer's has $2 million on hand.
The Koch network's decision to back away from Cramer is also a signal to the leaders of the Republican establishment that the group will not necessarily follow the guidance of GOP leadership.
The Koch brothers also made it clear through surrogates at the convention that they consider Trump's trade policies to be so damaging as to warrant crisis-level thinking.
"The divisiveness of this White House is causing long-term damage. When in order to win on an issue someone else has to lose, it makes it very difficult to unite people and solve the problems in this country. You see that on trade: In order to get to a good place on trade, convince the American people that trade is bad," Brian Hooks, a senior Koch lieutenant, told reporters who were attending the network donor conference, according to Politico.
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One person who has been outspoken in his displeasure toward the Kochs' current attitude is Trump's former chief strategist, Steve Bannon.
"What they have to do is shut up and get with the program, OK? And here’s the program: Ground game to support Trump’s presidency and program, [and] victory on Nov. 6," Bannon told Politico. The former Breitbart executive characterized the Kochs' opposition to Trump as one born of ideological pickiness rather than meaningful principle.
“We can have a theoretical discussion later, OK?" Bannon told Politico. "This is why they don’t know what it means to win, OK? We don’t have time to have some theoretical discussion and to have their spokesman come out and say the president is divisive."
He also made it clear that he viewed their statements about Trump, "for them to come out and talk about divisiveness," as nothing short of a betrayal.
"They were the first people to put the knife in his back," Bannon told Politico. He was willing to throw a minor concession Koch's way . . . but only a minor one.
"Charles Koch is a good man, but 100 days before an election that will determine the direction of the country is not the time to tell us that you are prepared to work with Democrats that support parts of your progressive agenda,” Bannon told Politico.
He added, “It's wrong, it's stupid and it shows contempt for the hardworking grassroots folks that delivered the victory that got your tax cut."
Koch spokesman James Davis did not seem ruffled by Bannon's criticisms, however.
"We are focused on uniting the country to help remove barriers that are preventing people from reaching the potential. Toward that end, we look forward to working with President Trump, Congress and communities whenever possible to help people improve their lives," Davis told Politico.
It isn't like the Kochs' eventual position on the Heitkamp-Cramer race wasn't foreshadowed, as The Washington Post reported on Monday:
Earlier this year, AFP ran a digital ad thanking Heitkamp for co-sponsoring a bill that rolls back regulations placed on banks after the 2008 financial crisis.
On Monday, AFP chief executive Emily Seidel sought to underscore the importance of the network’s independence, saying a GOP senator who she did not name reportedly told colleagues at a Republican caucus meeting, “Don’t worry about the Kochs. They’re going to support Republicans regardless.”
“And by Kochs, he was talking about all of you. We can’t keep falling into the trap just doing what we need to do to get through November,” she told donors.
While it's tempting for those on the left to bemoan the fact that the Kochs are still predominantly backing Republican candidates, it is nevertheless a major development that a family so closely tied to the financial future of the Republican Party is willing to punish Republican candidates who support the president's positions. If nothing else, it shows that the backlash against Trump by many conservatives during the 2016 Republican presidential primaries has not entirely subsided. The only question that remains is whether this schism will be enough to take down Trump's presidency if, say, Special Counsel Robert Mueller's ongoing probe reveals indisputably criminal activity.
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