How the GOP institutionalists are losing the larger battle

And while the institutionalists won this week and the Trump wing suffered a rebuke, the battle among the Republican electorate is going a very different way. The institutionalists of the Republican Party are losing out to those who have Trump’s blessing.

We don’t have a lot of really good polling on how voters view Cheney and Greene. The numbers we do have suggest what you might expect. Cheney’s ratings are strongly negative among Republicans nationally. Greene’s mostly unknown, but has better ratings among those Republicans who are familiar with her.

Where we do have a lot of high quality polling is the leaders of Congress, particularly McConnell. He has arguably been the most mainstream Republican (i.e. not inherently anti-Trump) to try and move the party on from Trump. His popularity among Republicans has plummeted as a result.

Take a look at a Quinnipiac University poll out this week. It tested the ratings of different leaders.

McConnell came in with just a 21% approval to 67% disapproval rating among Americans at-large. He sported the lowest approval and highest disapproval rating of any of the party leaders in Congress.

Even among Republicans, he came in with just a 31% approval rating compared to a 51% unfavorable rating. (CNN/SSRS showed his favorable rating among Republicans somewhat higher in January, though still under his unfavorable rating.) McConnell ended his time as Senate majority leader with the worst intraparty ratings for a Senate majority leader since 1985.

Now compare where McConnell is to Trump. In the same CNN poll, Trump came in with a 34% approval rating and a 62% disapproval rating. With Republicans, he was at 80% approval to 17% disapproval. This comports with Trump remaining in a strong position for the 2024 nomination.

Clearly, Republican prefer Trump to McConnell.

You won’t find another party leader in Congress who sports a net negative approval rating among their own party, including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who has…

Read the full article at rss.cnn.com

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How the GOP institutionalists are losing the larger battle

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