By Rick Manning
I face the same dilemma that many Trump supporting conservatives face — what to do when a Never Trumper who opposes many of your priorities gets the GOP nominee.
In my case the self-proclaimed Never Trumper is former Maryland Governor Larry Hogan.
It is difficult to rationalize voting for former Governor Hogan as he abdicated any claim that becoming the Party nominee should override other concerns when it comes to defeating Democrats after the primary election in 2022.
Two years ago, then-Governor Hogan’s anointed candidate to replace him lost the GOP nomination to a Donald Trump supporting state legislator. Hogan’s first reaction was to attack the just nominated Republican. On ABC’s This Week in 2022, Hogan attacked the Republican nominee as “a conspiracy theory believing kind of nut job.”
But Hogan didn’t stop there, when he declared to Jake Tapper on CNN in 2022, “I can tell you I’m not giving up, it just makes me want to double down and fight back against what I think is kind of a hostile takeover of the party that I love.”
Well, Larry, the shoe is now on the other foot.
It will be difficult to vote for a “Republican” who spent more time attacking President Trump when he was in office than he has spent attacking Joe Biden. It will be difficult to vote for a “Republican” who is politically to the left of Mitt Romney and has aspirations of undermining the Trump agenda should they both get elected. And it will be difficult to vote for a “Republican” who will be the first to go on the left-wing media networks to denounce any conservative GOP nominee, creating the story, “GOP split on Trump Supreme Court Nominee”. And that is what Senator Larry Hogan would do.
Larry Hogan does not believe in party fealty, yet he benefitted from that when he ran for Governor after serving as ground-breaking Republican Governor Robert Ehrlich’s appointment secretary eight years earlier.
I did vote for Hogan in his two successful bids for Governor, but truthfully, that was mainly because I like and admire the man who was his Lieutenant Governor, Boyd Rutherford.
In 2024, Larry Hogan stands alone. And from what I see, he is more likely to be a “No Labels” Senator than a Republican one.
On the other hand, the Democrats have nominated a typically liberal candidate, Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks, who won because the Democrat machine, led by the Governor who Hogan cleared the path for in 2022, delivered.
On Larry Hogan’s side, the National Republican Senatorial Committee is so enamored by having a Never Trump voice in the media, that it is rumored in D.C. political circles that they will spend up to $75 million to elect the former Governor.
The general election will likely revolve around the issue of who hates Trump most with Larry replaying his support for Trump’s impeachment as proof of his ‘bravery’ to stand against his Party.
Ironically, the only thing going for Larry in the general election is how awful a Senate Democrat Majority would be should their Party retake the House of Representatives and retain the presidency.
The two Democrat Senators who blocked attempts to end the filibuster and the cascade of far-left policies which would have become law are gone. Neither Arizona’s Kirsten Sinema nor West Virginia’s Joe Manchin will be in the Senate blocking 50 Democrats plus Vice President Kamala Harris from packing the Supreme Court, making the District of Columbia a state, massively increasing taxes, shuttering speech, ending state voter identification requirements where they exist, and prohibiting the sale of the internal combustion engine due to ‘climate’.
Voting for Larry Hogan would be based upon the fear of the havoc his opponent could create in a majority, and listening to the silent mantra which still runs in the deepest recesses of my brain, that any R is better than any D.
In some perverse way it is a plus that Hogan is honest about his hatred for Trump. He is honest that he will seek to undermine Trump’s agenda and will likely vote against more Trump nominees than any other Republican due to his view that anyone who supports him is a whack job. And he will be John McCain-like in his use of the Washington Post to attack President Trump in his bid to be viewed as virtuously courageous by those who will never accept him.
So with those low expectations for Hogan, he really couldn’t disappoint me.
Never Trump Hogan or a far-left standard issue Maryland Democrat Alsobrooks, that is the question? And I have no idea how I will answer it.
Rick Manning is the president of Americans for Limited Government and a former Town Councilman in Chesapeake Beach, Maryland.