Ronald Reagan biographer Craig Shirley was on Breitbart News Daily today with host Stephen K. Bannon on SiriusXM to discuss Reagan’s ongoing influence on the Republican Party as expressed through the vast outsider support that’s driven candidates like Ben Carson, Sen. Ted Cruz and front runner Donald Trump throughout the GOP primary.
“Nobody goes around calling themselves a Bush Republican, nobody calls themselves a Nixon Republican,” said Shirley, adding “most call themselves Reagan Republicans.” Shirley was addressing Bannon’s point that approximately 80 percent of GOP primary voters have voted for outsiders including Ben Carson, Ted Cruz or Donald Trump.
Shirley was on with Bannon to discuss a recent piece he penned along with former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich for publication in TIME. Both assert that the movement now driving the direction of the Republican primary is an extension of Reaganism, not the end of it, as some GOP establishment figures would assert.
Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and Ronald Reagan biographer Craig Shirley write that “Trump-Cruz outsiders are far more likely than the comfortable Washington establishment in achieving Reagan’s vision.”
The complete TIME item can be read here. Wrote Shirley and Gingrich, “In fact, the good news is that Reaganism is alive and well in America and in the GOP. It remains the dominant philosophy among center-right Americans. It is the old, Washington-centered GOP establishment that is threatened with diminution at best and extinction at worst.”
We understand the frustration some members of the GOP establishment must be feeling over the rise of Donald Trump. Trump’s success (compounded by Ted Cruz’s success) is putting the old order on trial. But just because the establishment class is feeling the heat today doesn’t mean that the Party of Reagan Is No More, as Peter Wehner contended in an essay for TIME.
Today’s entire interview with Craig Shirley can be heard below. Breitbart News Daily airs weekdays from 6AM to 9AM EST on Sirius XM Patriot 125.