GOP Senate Lemmings Headed For Cliff

 

There was a ton of info in the latest Change Research poll of new and infrequent voters in Arizona, Florida, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin that was released yesterday. "New and infrequent" but this year 84% of them say they are definitely voting. This is going to be the highest turnout election in our lifetimes and Trump is the motivating factor-- mostly antipathy towards him. Biden leads by 49-37% among these voters, who went for Hillary Clinton by 35-30%. Undecided voters are largely negative about both candidates, but they’re much more strongly negative about Trump than Biden. Biden leads among this cohort of voters in all 6 of these swing states-- 50-36% in Arizona, 52-37% in Florida, 58-31% in Michigan, 47-38% in North Carolina, 49-39% in Pennsylvania and 43-41% in Wisconsin. More factoids:

• Biden leads 44-16 among Gary Johnson voters
• Biden leads 42-17 among Jill Stein voters
• Biden leads 47-32 among those who did not vote in 2016
• A plurality of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents believe every single conspiracy theory and falsehood Change Research asked about, although more voters believe Trump is trying to suppress the vote, and that Russia is interfering, than that Democrats are trying to rig the election
• 5% of these voters would take a vaccine as soon as possible, even if it has not gone through standard safety procedures

And Republicans up and down the ballot are circling the drain with Trump. The latest poll in Arizona how's Mark Kelly ousting GOP incumbent Martha McSally by 10 points 52-42%. The latest poll in Maine has Sara Gideon beating GOP incumbent Susan Collins by 12 points 54-42%. The latest poll of Colorado voters shows them picking Hickenlooper over incumbent Cory Gardner by 10 points, 52-42%. Even in beet red South Carolina the latest polling shows Democratic lobbyist Jaime Harrison tied (48-48%) with Trump-whisperer Lindsey Graham!

Republican senators may know they're marching over the cliff but these lemmings are not breaking ranks with Trump. Eric Lutz wrote yesterday at Vanity Fair that Senate Republicans still seem dead set on doing Trump's dirty work. Especially Wisconsin sociopathic reactionary Ron Johnson, who has already announced his 2022 lame-duckiness.

I doubt there's a more blatant and preposterous hack in the Senate than Ron Johnson. Ginning up a fake investigation of Hunter Biden's moronic adventures in Ukraine, Johnson said, "I would think it would certainly help Donald Trump win reelection." He's been running around telling anyone who will listen that he has an October surprise to tarnish Biden coming out of his Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee fishing expedition.

Following a vote Wednesday morning, Johnson will expand his panel’s Crossfire Hurricane probe. The committee authorized dozens of subpoenas to be issued to Obama era officials, including Bruce Ohr and Andrew McCabe-- two frequent Trump targets over their role in the Russia investigation that consumed the first two years of his presidency. But another vote, to issue subpoenas in the Burisma probe, was canceled after Mitt Romney slammed that inquiry as a “political exercise” aimed at taking down Biden.

“It’s not the legitimate role of government, for Congress or for taxpayer expense, to be used in an effort to damage political opponents,” Romney said. “I do believe it's very important that the committees of Congress, and ours in particular, not fall into an increasing pattern that we're seeing, which is using taxpayer dollars and the power of Congress to do political work. That's the role of campaigns.”

Romney, the only Republican who voted to convict during Trump’s impeachment trial earlier this year, had previously expressed concerns that Johnson’s Burisma probe was being driven by partisan politics rather than oversight. On Wednesday, he said recent remarks by the committee leader “have only confirmed that perspective.” He was likely referring to comments Johnson made earlier this week during a video conference with Republicans, in which he promised to release a report that would hurt Biden politically. “Stay tuned,” the Wisconsin Republican said, as reported by the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. “In about a week we’re going to learn a whole lot more of Vice President Biden’s unfitness for office.”

Of course, there’s been no evidence that Biden did anything wrong in Ukraine, and Gary Peters, the top Democrat on the committee, has railed against Johnson for “knowingly advancing discredited claims that our own Intelligence Community has warned are part of a Russian attack on our democracy.” Nevertheless, Johnson has continued to promise a report by election day November 3.

With his sharp rebuke of the Burisma probe, Romney effectively got the vote to issue subpoenas in the Burisma probe scrapped. But the Utah Senator did vote in favor of dozens of subpoenas in the committee’s investigation into the origins of the FBI’s Russia inquiry, which the president and his allies have claimed was a “witch hunt” by deep state officials who sought to undermine Barack Obama’s successor. Michael Horowitz, the Justice Department’s inspector general, identified procedural missteps by federal law enforcement in the early days of the investigation, but found no evidence of political bias. Still, Attorney General William Barr and other Trump allies have been investigating their boss’s investigators, particularly since Biden, the vice president under Obama, became the Democratic nominee. Romney expressed support for a narrow inquiry by Johnson’s committee into the errors outlined by Horowitz, as long as it “does not fall in the realm of rank political undertaking.” But, in the hands of a loyalist like Johnson, whose stated mission is to damage Biden and help Trump, it’s hard to imagine such a probe being anything but that.

Yesterday afternoon, Johnson announced he has COVID-19 and is going into quarantine. Pray that the October surprise isn't the one he was plotting. Samantha Bee has a November surprise to discuss: