Some in GOP who deserted Donald Trump are now returning
Several House and Senate members reversed themselves and are again supporting Donald Trump to try to keep Hillary Clinton out of the White House
Washington: Stung by a fierce backlash from Donald Trump’s ardent supporters, four Republican members of Congress who had made headlines for demanding that Trump leave the presidential race retreated quietly this week, conceding that they would still probably vote for the man they had excoriated just days before.
From senator. John Thune of South Dakota to Rep. Scott Garrett, R-N.J., who is locked in a difficult re-election fight, the lawmakers contorted themselves over Trump. Some of them would not mention him by name, preferring instead to affirm their support for the generic “Republican ticket."
They said that if Trump would not make way for his running mate, governor Mike Pence of Indiana, to lead the party after the release of a recording on Friday showing Trump bragging about groping women, they had little choice but to vote for their embattled nominee. But the collective about-face owed less to Trump’s refusal to exit a race in which ballots are already being cast than to the fury his supporters unleashed at the defectors at rallies and on social media.
And Trump, himself, escalated his feud with the country’s highest-ranking elected Republican, Speaker Paul D. Ryan, saying at a rally in Florida on Wednesday that Ryan’s refusal to actively support his candidacy was part of a “sinister deal going on."
The reversals back to Trump’s camp included Rep. Bradley Byrne, of Alabama. He said flatly over the weekend, “It is now clear Donald Trump is not fit to be president of the US," but he insisted to reporters on Wednesday that he had always said he would “be a supporter of the Republican ticket from top to bottom."
On Saturday, senator Deb Fischer of Nebraska, who is not up for re-election until 2018, said, “It would be wise for him to step aside and allow Mike Pence to serve as our party’s nominee." But on Tuesday, she explained why she was still backing Trump.
“He decided he would not step aside. I respect his decision," she said. “I support the Republican ticket, and it’s a Trump-Pence ticket." ©2016/The New York Times
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