Monday, MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” reacted to former President Donald Trump having a microphone set up at Mar-a-Lago with a band to entertain and speak to crowds. “Never Trump” network contributor Charlie Sykes agreed with host Joe Scarborough that there is a “personality cult” problem in the GOP after Trump entered the fray. He argued that “Ronald Reagan couldn’t win a primary in the Republican Party these days” because of how much the party has changed into “blind loyalty” for Trump.
“It leads me to wonder, could a guy that you saw and I saw from the time he was 25, growing up in public service, who eventually became speaker of the House, Paul Ryan — could Paul Ryan be speaker of the House right now for this Republican Party?” Scarborough asked.
“No. No chance,” Sykes replied. “In fact, Ronald Reagan couldn’t win a primary in the Republican Party these days. You know what’s really extraordinary about the Liz Cheney and the Mitt Romney stories right now is look at their actual voting records. Liz Cheney is, you know, she’s not like us, Joe. She’s not a squishy RINO. She has a plus 95% rating from conservative groups. She was a Trump loyalist up until January 6. Mitt Romney’s not voting for the Biden agenda.”
He added, “My point is here that these are Republicans that are very conservative, have been very consistent, and yet, because of the one issue, the lack of … blind loyalty to Donald Trump, they’re being cast out. So, there is no other litmus test. It does not matter whether you have been a fiscal conservative, whether you have voted down the line with the Republican Party. This is the only thing that counts right now — whether you will buy the big lie, whether you will defend Donald Trump, whether you will look the other way for January 6. And I don’t see any indication that that’s changing anytime soon.”
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