Former Illinois Lt. Gov. Bob Kustra (R) says he is surprised President Donald Trump is mulling naming the Republican Party after himself at a time when the party should be going out of its way to avoid him.
“Some will write off Trump’s ruminations about changing the name to ‘Tpublican’ ... as another of his egomaniacal rants to distract the media from learning about playboy Trump’s earlier years with Jeffrey Epstein,” said Kustra. “Yet, few believed Trump would tear down the entire East Wing of the White House to create a Mar-a-Lago North."
“This is the American president who has plastered the Oval Office with gold, now converted to the Trump family cash register with real estate deals and crypto scams ringing up sales for the billionaire family,” Kustra added. “Most Americans would not expect a sitting president to approve a new dollar coin with his portrait on it, but it is in the planning stages. There seems no end to Trump disgracing the office of the presidency with his monumental ego and tacky taste.”
Instead, Kustra argued Trump’s latest attempt to stamp his name on the party ought to be the spark that finally “ignites a serious reconsideration of just what the Republican Party stands for and what the future holds for” the GOP.
There’s good reason to disavow the president now that the latest Gallup poll shows Trump and his party in trouble, with only 36 percent of Americans approving of his job performance. “Fair-weather Republicans” and independents who voted for Trump in 2024 are already turning to Democrats as of the recent off-year elections. And now Kustra said Republicans are in danger of losing control of Congress in the 2026 midterm elections.
“Once the law-and-order party, Republicans are now led by a president who just pardoned a Honduran ex-president serving a 45-year term for receiving millions in bribes and partnering with narcotics traffickers,” said Kustra. “Trump also commuted the sentence of a private equity executive who just began a seven-year sentence for a $1.6 billion scheme that defrauded thousands of investors. But Trump had no problem calling for the execution of U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly, a war hero, who reminded our military forces they did not have to follow orders that broke the law.”
Kustra said some Republicans are already catching on, with Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) stiffing Trump on killing the filibuster and Republican Armed Services Committee Chair Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) joining his Democratic counterpart to investigate allegations that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered survivors killed in recent U.S. strikes on boats off South America. The House Committee followed suit assuring bipartisan oversight in both chambers.
Meanwhile, Kustra said Trump is being outfoxed by Chinese President Xi Jinping on tariffs and “played for a fool” by war criminal Vladimir Putin.
“With an increasingly self-absorbed and unhinged president losing ground with some Republicans in Congress, it hardly seems the moment to attach any semblance of the Trump surname to their party,” Kustra added. “Now is the time to rebuild the Republican Party with Trump as a mere footnote of times gone bad.”
Read Kustra's Kansas City Star column at this link.