After losing to Joe Miller in the 2010 primary, Sen. Lisa Murkowski bucked the Republican establishment by mounting a historic write-in campaign. She justified her action by saying Alaskans “cannot accept the extremist views of Joe Miller and equally, we can’t accept the inexperience of Mr. (Scott) McAdams”, the Democrat’s nominee. This year she should be using those two adjectives to describe one candidate she’s refusing to accept — Donald Trump for President.
Back in 2010, the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) expected Murkowski to accept her primary defeat without a whimper. They planned to support Miller in the general election and pledged $200,000 toward his campaign.
“If Senator Murkowski is truly committed to doing what is right for her state,” the NRSC said in an official statement, “then we hope that she will step forward and fully endorse Joe Miller’s candidacy.”
After Murkowski formerly announced her write-in campaign, Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., then the minority leader, and his lieutenants stripped her of her senate leadership role within the party. And state GOP officials worried McAdams would win if Murkowski and Miller split the conservative vote.
No one in the party establishment supported Murkowski’s write-in bid for reelection. And why would they? She was running against one of their own. In their party–before–the–people view, she was violating what Ronald Reagan referred to as the eleventh commandment. “You should speak no ill of another Republican.”
Donald Trump could care less about that. He publicly insulted every one of his opponents during the party’s nominating process and ridicules any other Republican who challenges him. He’s also refused to reciprocate the official endorsements he received from House Speaker Paul Ryan and Arizona Sen. John McCain.
Murkowski hasn’t offered any enthusiastic support for Trump. All she’s said is she’s always supported her party’s presidential nominee. She didn’t even attend the GOP’s national convention, although she claims she had to be in Alaska campaigning for this month’s primary.
Trump probably knows very little about Alaska politics. Otherwise he’d recognize that Murkowski’s excuse for missing his convention was lame. All anyone has to do is look at the campaign websites of her opponents to realize she has no serious competition this year.
Unlike 2010, Murkowski has no debates listed on her campaign’s schedule of events. Back then she debated Miller three times, including one sponsored by the Kenai/Soldotna Chamber of Commerce. This year she skipped the Chamber’s candidate forum even though one of her primary challengers was there.
Simply stated, Murkowski’s decision to campaign here before the primary was a charade that let her avoid the appearance of directly endorsing Trump. She’s only backing him “to stick by the process,” which means “standing by the party nominee.” That’s how she explained the NRSC’s support for Miller in 2010 while adding that “they may not be doing it gladly.”
Why can’t Murkowski be like Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who made it clear to voters he’s not endorsing Trump? Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-South Carolina, and Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., are two other Republican who aren’t afraid to say they don’t support Trump. And there’s several others in the House who aren’t backing him.
But then again, these honest souls are a small minority in their party. The rest are united in keeping Hillary Clinton out of the White House. And Trump expects to play that to his advantage.
“Even if people don’t like me, they have to vote for me,” Trump said Tuesday. “They have no choice.”
That’s because Clinton is more than the Democratic party’s presidential nominee for 2016. Party leaders and conservative pundits have been warning against a Clinton presidency since 2007. And she’s been despised by most Republican voters since she was First Lady. That’s why GOP members of congress are stuck riding the “hate Hillary” bandwagon.
But there’s something else defeating Clinton offers the GOP leadership. It’s a chance to end a pattern of broken promises. Since 2010 they’ve failed to repeal Obamacare and couldn’t prevent the legalization of same sex marriage. Going back further, their balanced budget initiative has been nothing but talk since Bill Clinton left the White House. Roe Vs. Wade is still the law of the land. And the Department of Education is still up and running.
Murkowski’s dilemma is simple. Secretly she probably hopes Trump loses. But if he does, she doesn’t want Republican voters blaming her for helping send Clinton into the White House. Because the outfall from that failure may be an angry mob that’ll make the Tea Party revolt of 2010 look like a family social gathering.
• Rich Moniak is a Juneau resident and retired civil engineer with more than 25 years of experience working in the public sector.
