United States: these Republicans who hope for the defeat of Donald Trump

Text by: Thomas Harms

7 min

Behind the displayed unity of the Republicans at their convention this week, there are however opponents of Donald Trump within his party. They are even virulent, and very visible on social networks.

Publicity

If you're on Twitter, you must have seen them pass! Effective Lincoln Project ads have been viewed and shared millions of times. They are ready to smile, like this one:

pic.twitter.com/3kh81WYNTu

They are aggressive like this:

“He is a f & * king moron.” - Rex Tillerson, Trump's former Secretary of State pic.twitter.com/ZbsJ9300mu

Or they are unexpected like this one, where we see former President Ronald Reagan, the Republican champion, as a herald against the party candidate: Donald Trump.

What will future generations say of our decisions today?

President Ronald Reagan asked that 36 years ago.

As we look to the week ahead, his words are as timely as ever. pic.twitter.com/fmKHNDc8ie

“  The videos we produce are so powerful they go viral  ”: Jacob Monty is a lawyer. A lifelong Republican, he is part of the management team of the Lincoln Project in Texas. “  Besides, the curator in me is won over by their low cost, barely $ 5 to $ 10,000. And then no need to advertise it, social networks do it for us  ”. The Lincoln Project was launched last December with an op-ed in the New York Times with the unequivocal headline, "  We're Republicans, We Want Trump To Be Defeated  ."

In nine months, this public action committee (a PAC that funds campaigns or, as in their case, attacks a candidate) has raised 19.4 million and currently spent 8 million on advertisements and videos against Donald Trump. . These anti-Trump Republicans ( Never Trumper as Donald Trump calls them) are part of the party's old guard. The one who no longer recognizes herself in what the Republican Party has become under Donald Trump and which the party did not invite during the Republican convention. Many have worked with George HW Bush and George W. Bush (who announced that he would not vote for Donald Trump) and with Senator John McCain (whose widow signed up for Joe Biden). For Jacob Monty, “  there are a lot of Republicans who are going to distance themselves from Trump. They may not be as outspoken as I am, but in the privacy of the ballot box they are disgusted with Trump  ”.

But the Lincoln Project's strategy questions Democrats. Twitter ads are unlikely to reach undecided Republicans. The Lincoln Project responds: their target is first and foremost Donald Trump himself, on his favorite media. And the ads are designed to piss him off. As Steve Schmidt, one of the co-founders of the Lincoln Project, explains in an interview with the Washington Post , "  These videos are used to use Donald Trump's mental infirmity and television addiction to cripple and manipulate him  ." In other words, if the Lincoln Project's commercials can serve to distract the president and keep him from focusing on other things, it's already worth it.

We owe them this #TrumpIsNotWell video which made the front page of the American media and reached Donald Trump to the point that he took nearly ten minutes to try to dismantle it during his meeting in Tusla, on June 20.

Within the Lincoln Project, it is also credited with the ousting of Donald Trump's campaign manager in mid-July after he saw a video suggesting that Brad Pascale had become a millionaire on his back. Donald Trump asked him to explain details of this video.

This is just another example that @realDonaldTrump is the worst manager America has ever seen. Don, you got conned… by your IT guy. pic.twitter.com/ssO5CERqBu

Perhaps it was the publicity that instilled doubt in the mind of the American president, and sealed his fate (combined with the fiasco of the half-empty meeting in Tulsa that Brad Pascale had organized). But this strategy of ad hominem attack also makes Democrats uncomfortable. This is exactly the one Donald Trump and his team used against Hilary Clinton in 2016.

Alarmist political ads have been around for many US election campaigns. They were used in particular by the Bush father and son in 1988 and 2004. Two campaigns where most of the founders of the Lincoln Project were very active, and where their speeches were of Trump before the hour. Did they not then help to make the Republican Party what it has become, when they could have prevented it? ask their detractors.

Democrats are more comfortable with another group, “Republican Voters Against Donald Trump,” which initially invested several million dollars to collect testimony from 100 disappointed Republican voters.
Now their site is full of videos shot from cell phones, computers or Zoom.

Like Cindy from Houston,

Cindy from Houston is a lifelong Republican who will be voting Joe in 2020.

"In 2016, when I became an Independent, Texas wasn't yet a swing state as it is now ... This year I'm voting for Joe Biden because he's a decent person, he's empathetic and he's patriotic. " pic.twitter.com/JyQ0IKXinS

or Mike from Pennsylvania,

Trump's corrupt and selfish leadership has caused lifelong Republican Mike to endorse Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

"It seems like every Trump decision is made for Trump and not for the country ... His leadership is letting us down in crucial times." pic.twitter.com/JztmLaGBu5

Over 500 average citizens speaking directly to other Republican voters, state by state. Because the presidential election next November will also be played locally, and in particular in the pivot States.

► To read also: US Presidential: these Republicans campaigning against Trump

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• United States
• Donald trump
• USA Elections 2020

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