"Schmidt explained his decision to leave the party

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"Schmidt explained his decision to leave the party in a lengthy Twitter thread, calling it “corrupt, indecent and immoral” and filled with “feckless cowards,” with a few exceptions for governors like Charlie Baker of Massachusetts, Larry Hogan of Maryland, and John Kasich of Ohio.”

Former McCain Campaign Manager Quits GOP, Calling It “Corrupt, Indecent, and Immoral”

By SOFIE WERTHAN
JUNE 21, 20184:45 PM


Actor Woody Harrelson and Republican political strategist Steve Schmidt, whom Harrelson portrayed in the HBO film Game Change, arrive at an event in 2012.

Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images

Steve Schmidt, a longtime Republican strategist and John McCain’s 2008 campaign manager, announced this week that he is leaving the GOP. He warned that the Republican Party has become a “danger to our democracy and values” and called for a Democratic wave in the 2018 midterm elections.

Schmidt explained his decision to leave the party in a lengthy Twitter thread, calling it “corrupt, indecent and immoral” and filled with “feckless cowards,” with a few exceptions for governors like Charlie Baker of Massachusetts, Larry Hogan of Maryland, and John Kasich of Ohio.

Schmidt cited the Trump administration’s child separations as one of the main factors that led to his decision to leave the party. He said the policy was “connected to the worst abuses of humanity in our history,” drawing parallels between the zero-tolerance immigration policy and historical examples of families being separated during slavery and the government’s forced displacement of Native American communities.

Schmidt did not hold back in his tweets, declaring that the “complicit leaders” in the Republican Party—including Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, Sen. Mitch McConnell, and House Speaker Paul Ryan—“will carry this shame through history. … They have disgraced their country and brought dishonor to the Party of Lincoln.”

In a Wednesday interview with the Washington Post, Schmidt clarified that Trump’s election alone did not push him over the edge—instead, he said his decision was compounded by the way Republicans in Congress have acted in the wake of his presidency.

“The reality is that our Founders always predicted that one day there would be a president like Trump, and that’s why they designed the system of government the way they designed it,” Schmidt explained.

“What they never imagined is the utter abdication of a co-equal branch of government, which we’re seeing now. … The definition of conservatism now is the requirement of complete and utter obedience to the leader.”

Schmidt was a top campaign adviser to George Bush in 2004. While managing McCain’s unsuccessful presidential bid, he recommended Sarah Palin to be McCain’s running mate. (Schmidt later admitted that this was a mistake and criticized Palin’s “divisive message.”)

Schmidt is not alone in his frustration and distress over recent shifts in the GOP. Since Trump’s political ascendance, several other conservative figures have publicly announced that they are leaving the Republican Party because of the political direction it has taken.

In June 2016, the conservative columnist George Will announced that he was changing his political affiliation from Republican to “unaffiliated” in response to Trump’s candidacy. “This is not my party,” Will was quoted as saying, and he urged Republicans to nominate someone else for the party’s presidential nomination. Trump had previously attacked Will and called him a “major loser” over a Washington Post column he had written that was highly critical of Trump.

In July 2017, Joe Scarborough, the host of MSNBC’s Morning Joe and a former Republican congressman from Florida, announced that he was leaving the party to become an independent. Like Will, Scarborough was upset that Republicans had been unwilling to stand up to Trump’s antics.

Scarborough said he believed the party leaders had “betrayed their core values” by uncritically supporting Trump. “You have to ask yourself, what exactly is the Republican Party willing to do?”

Scarborough said in an interview with Stephen Colbert. “How far are they willing to go? How much of this country and our values are they willing to sell out?”

Schmidt’s sharp rebuke of the Republican Party was met with mixed reactions online. Some Republicans have mocked him or called him a RINO. Conservative television and radio talk show host Laura Ingraham responded to the news with a large dose of snark, tweeting, “Perpetually losing GOP ‘consultant’ leaves GOP! Stop the presses!” (Schmidt fired back, “Hey Laura you’ve been fired from a lot more media gigs than I’ve lost campaigns.”)

This latest departure from the Republican Party is striking in how extensive and forceful Schmidt’s critiques of his longtime party have been. Like Will and Scarborough, Schmidt has emphasized the dangers of prioritizing party over country and expressed concerns over the increasingly divisive and hostile political climate.

However, he has gone farther than others by openly calling for a Democratic wave during the midterm elections. It seems like the rift between conservatives who support Trump and those who are distressed by his leadership is only growing wider.

Bill Brice
17 minutes ago

I have often seen and heard Schmidt on MSNBC. He's always given intelligent, thoughtful commentary; and he hasn't held back on his criticism of Trump-world. I had to wonder how he could remain Republican. Well, he couldn't, of course. I assume Schmidt has pretty conservative ideas about governance -- I mean "conservative" in the old sense, meaning a belief in the restraint of government management over public affairs.

But, starting around the time of Newt Gingrich, "conservative" has been defined as just a prevailing nastiness of spirit, a raw "tribalism" that permits any amount of soulless, anti-American "us against them" howling. Schmidt was clearly reluctant to abandon the old GOP. But that GOP has ceased to exist. He might well say "I didn't leave the GOP. It left me".

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