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From the May 3, 2021, edition of Real America's Voice's The Water Cooler
DAVID BRODY (HOST): Well, look, a MAGA definitely got some momentum this weekend in Texas. And that Romney episode, we didn't hear it there, but there were boos and boos in Utah. It really does speak volumes as to what's happening here.
RICK KLEIN (GUEST): Yeah, look, if there's a Republican civil war, then Donald Trump keeps winning round after round and sometimes he's not even that involved. Obviously, the Utah convention happened without his particular involvement and they still had the boos. The Liz Cheney moment, as you said, speak for itself. But it comes as she has sort of dug in on her position that Donald Trump doesn't have a position in the future of the party and in that Texas race, I agree with you, the headline, of course, is that Susan Wright, who's the widow of a congressman who died of COVID related complications, she's first in that race. But, yeah, the fact that the anti-Trump Republican ends up with about three percent of the vote in that distant ninth place, that was a big whiff by anti-Trump Republican forces. So, look, Trump is as strong as he has been in some time, three months or so after leaving office. He is a major force inside the Republican Party. And you see that play out at state, local and national levels almost every day.
BRODY: You know what's interesting here, Rick? Liz Cheney out today with a statement saying, you know, no, it's not the big lie. I mean, he's wrong. And, of course, we expected that. But leave it to Trump to provide not just a demarcation line, but this is, in essence, a line in the sand, if you will, in the GOP ranks. In other words, now every Republican member is going to be asked — so do you think it's the big lie? Do you think it’s — I mean, this puts Republican, the Republicans are going to have to go on record basically to either agree with Trump or disagree on this new language, the big lie.
KLEIN: Yeah, it comes at a time where you're just beginning to see Republicans come to terms with how to handle that exactly. Even some who supported the efforts to overturn the election results back on January 6th. They’ve changed their tune a little bit and started to say, well, it wouldn't have actually changed the full impact of the election. Even Kevin McCarthy has said that. And you're right, I think by Trump trying to co-opt that, quote unquote, big lie language, it forces the issue back into the conversation. It gives fresh fodder to it. And it's possible that it becomes a litmus test for Republicans vying for the Trump endorsement and maybe trying to win a primary. Do you or do not believe that Joe Biden was rightfully unfairly elected president?
BRODY: So where does this leave Kevin McCarthy? I mean, it just seems like Liz Cheney is kind of begging him to do something here. I mean, McCarthy's got to figure this out pretty quick. He can't let this fester, I would think.
KLEIN: No. And I'll tell you, there's there's members of Kevin McCarthy conference that want to bring another vote sometime this month to try to strip her of her leadership position. She survived that vote a few months ago. But this, their feeling is that if you're going to continue to poke your eye or poke our eyes out over this, then we're going to have to have some kind of retribution because you want someone in leadership that speaks for where the party is. And it's a tough situation because Liz Cheney knew exactly what she was doing when she cast that vote for impeachment. She knows what she's doing now when she continues to say that Donald Trump should not be a force in the party moving forward. But the way that these members of Congress are responding, as you say, the MAGA base is very strong with them.
BRODY: I know it's just, whatever it is, May of 2021, who knows what day it is today anyhow, but May of 2021 and we've got a while to the midterms. But we've talked to Kevin McCarthy, who was on the show a couple of weeks ago. He said ten out of ten that they're going to take back the house. Nathan Gonzales said, you know, Nathan, he's been on this show many times from Inside Elections saying that it's it would be a major disappointment if Republicans did not win back the House. What's your sense there in terms of at least the terrain we are in right now in terms of Republicans potentially winning in the midterms in 2022?
KLEIN: Yeah, they've got history on their side of the opposition party almost always has major gains in the first midterm. And all of the recent presidents have lost control of Congress at some point. They also have redistricting as well as reapportionment on their side. And these incredibly narrow margins, you just need basically three additional Republicans elected and ousting Democrats or replacing Democrats, and you have the majority. So the conventional wisdom will remain for some time that it's Republicans to lose. But, you know, it's also capable they're also capable of losing it. You never know what's going to happen when you go out there. There are some high-risk bets that are being made, not just siding with Trump, but also opposing the Biden agenda, portions of which are pretty popular out there. So it leaves it leaves Democrats in a position where they feel like they're governing almost on borrowed time. They have to get what they can get done as quickly as possible. And Republicans worried about overstepping are worried about getting in their own way. And fights like this are just not productive. This is not where Republicans want to be spending their time in 2021 or 2022 fighting among themselves. They'd much rather take the fight to Democrats and pick up those seats that they need.