“Donald Trump is the death knell of the Republican party.”
“Hi, my name is Paul Emens, I’m a lifelong Republican, I live in the state of Virginia, and I do not want to see Donald Trump in the White House again. In a quick synopsis, I think he’s clearly lacking in principles. He tends to be narcissistic, he’s all about himself, he certainly cares nothing about the Republican Party. It’s just a platform for him to grease his way forward.
“How he phrases his comments toward those who oppose him politically are frightening for democracy. How he tries to destroy and does destroy politicians who have the audacity to not be his sycophants… that’s frightening. All of that subverts democracy, and he’s continuing it with the way he speaks of prosecutors, judges, anybody that’s out of favor with him, he tears him apart. That’s not any president I want to have.
“The polarization was made to order for Donald Trump. He feeds on it, he enhances it, he aggravates it. He pushes people away from each other to achieve his goals, whatever those goals might be. And you can see it on the way that the Republican party… too many Republicans in Congress have reacted to those kind of actions by Trump. For example, we had a pretty darn good immigration bill that most of the Republicans would’ve supported, hands down, two years ago. As soon as they announced they had this bill, Trump said, I don’t want it, I’m gonna use it against the Democrats. The Republicans fell into line, that immigration bill is not gonna be passed. That’s a crime. That’s just so aggravating. We had a solution, or at least a partial solution. Donald Trump tubed it, and that’s the best example of polarization you’re ever gonna get. As Republicans, what we really need to think about is what has he done for the party? And if you go back historically and you look at the results, while Donald Trump was in office in 2018, the Republicans lost seats. In 2020, they lost their presidency and they lost seats. In 2022, instead of having a landslide victory, they barely squeaked by with a majority. Donald Trump is the death knell of the Republican Party.
“And as far as the indictments that go for Donald Trump and his efforts to subvert the election, that too is unforgivable. He’s a danger to democracy. When I think about January 6th and the speech that Donald Trump made, and the actions and inactions that Donald Trump took or didn’t take on January 6th, I can’t help remembering what my brother said that afternoon. He was my older brother, a Vietnam vet, twice decorated, kind of liked Trump’s policies. But on January 6th, as the riot engulfed the Capitol, my brother called me up and very angrily said, “that man is dead to me.” By that he didn’t mean physically, he meant he was done with President Trump, that this entire mess on January 6th was Donald Trump’s responsibility and he failed. He utterly failed.”