The GOP Has a Mess on Its Hands

“How do we get out of this?”

That’s the question preoccupying the right these days. The specific “this” varies, but what unites all the concerns is the mess Donald Trump has made.

For Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, the “this” is the embarrassing mess in Georgia, where many gettable Republican voters believe there’s no point in returning to the polls for the Senate runoff next month.

Hence one of the great ironies of 2020: For two years, Democrats falsely claimed Republicans had stolen the governor’s race from Stacey Abrams with “voter suppression.” Now, because of the president’s tantrum, Republicans are poised to give away two Senate seats—and control of the Senate—by actually suppressing their own vote with equally false claims of fraud. Even Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, the Trump loyalist who defeated Abrams, is now said to be in on a conspiracy to hand the state to Joe Biden.