GOP's elite are trapped in a Trumpian 'prison' of their own making: Bush official

Despite facing four criminal indictments, former President Donald Trump remains the hands-down frontrunner in the 2024 GOP presidential primary. A Morning Consult poll released on September 6 finds Trump leading the primary's second-place candidate, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, by 45 percent.

In late August, Trump's leads over DeSantis in polls ranged from 46 percent (the Wall Street Journal) to 34 percent (CNN).

Never Trump conservative and former George W. Bush Administration official Christian Vanderbrouk, in a scathing article published by The Bulwark on September 7, argues that establishment Republicans who are frustrated by Trump's stranglehold on their party have no one but themselves to blame. The GOP establishment, Vanderbrouk stresses, had every chance to move on from Trump after he left the White House — and blew it.

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"The dread is palpable," Vanderbrouk writes. "Donald Trump's dominance over the Republican Party and his overwhelming lead in primary polling has some conservatives shaking their fists at the sky…. We can stipulate that the team behind Ron DeSantis has done their candidate no favors. But reserve the lion's share of blame for the conservative movement as a whole, which acceded to the purge of anti-Trump leaders like Liz Cheney and stifled criticism of the January 6th riot."

The Never Trumper adds, "As a result, Trump is virtually untouchable within the party. His personal corruption, his criminal behavior, and his offenses against the American people and the Constitution are all taboo subjects for his leading primary opponent."

Vanderbrouk laments that "conservatives built this prison for themselves" when they threw former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyoming) under the bus in 2021.

"Instead of a much-needed reckoning after January 6th," the ex-Bush Administration official recalls, "the movement capitulated, sidelining anyone who failed to truckle to Trump."

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Find Christian Vanderbrouk's full article for The Bulwark at this link.