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Many Republicans who've opposed President-elect Donald Trump have found themselves in a political wilderness since breaking with him. That's even more true now after the former President's victory in the 2024 election. NPR's Sarah McCammon checked in with several anti-Trump republicans to ask what might come next for their movement.
SARAH MCCAMMON, BYLINE: Former President Donald Trump is known for rewarding loyalty and attacking his political enemies. Despite that risk, many current and former high-profile Republicans publicly opposed him and threw their weight behind Vice President Kamala Harris. Now those anti-Trump conservatives are regrouping, says Craig Snyder, former director of Haley Voters for Harris.
CRAIG SNYDER: These are people who had significant career, personal investments in Republican politics and who threw it all away, knowingly burned the bridge, because they couldn't abide Donald Trump and they wanted to support Vice President Harris.
MCCAMMON: They're also thinking about what went wrong. Snyder says he thinks efforts to win over center-right voters for Harris were successful in some areas. Exit polls suggest college-educated voters, especially women, moved toward Democrats this year. But Snyder says that movement wasn't enough given other trends in the electorate.
SNYDER: We were providing a kind of a transfusion into the democratic campaign. But the problem is that there was a hemorrhage that was bleeding out the other end with large groups of formerly traditionally Democratic voters, people who, frankly, the Democratic Party maybe had taken for granted.
MCCAMMON: Denver Riggleman, a former Republican Congressman and Chairman of Republicans for Harris in Virginia, uses a different analogy.
DENVER RIGGLEMAN: Really, in some areas, I think that the Republicans for Harris was a bit of a fart in the wind.
MCCAMMON: Former Illinois Congressman Joe Walsh says for him, this election confirmed that the Republican Party is fully the party of Trump.
JOE WALSH: There were others who held out hope that he'll lose and boom, boom, boom, Mitt Romney, Liz Cheney, everybody can get back in. We can remake it. I think now everyone understands that it's gone.
MCCAMMON: Walsh says people like him are left with few choices - form a new party or become a Democrat. Many are already joining the Democrats, says Tim Miller, a former republican strategist and host of "The Bulwark," a never-Trump podcast.
TIM MILLER: If you're going to be in opposition to Donald Trump, you're in alliance with Democrats. I think some never-Trumpers are going to be more comfortable with that than others.
MCCAMMON: While Trump won't be president again for a couple more months, his nominees for key cabinet positions are offering a window into how he will govern in a second term. Former Congressman Denver Riggleman says Trump's unorthodox choices for several posts have heightened his concerns about threats to the democratic system.
RIGGLEMAN: He's doing exactly what he said he was going to do with his appointments also. I mean, these are the worst batch of political appointees, I believe we can say, maybe ever.
MCCAMMON: Olivia Troye, a former Trump administration Homeland Security official who served as a surrogate for the Harris campaign, shares that worry.
OLIVIA TROYE: I'm watching very closely what Republican senators do on the Hill when it comes to some of these confirmation hearings and whether they're going to confirm some of these people that I think are not fit for the leadership in the departments that they're going to lead.
MCCAMMON: Some anti-Trump republicans worry not only about what comes next for their party and their country, but for themselves, given Trump's threats to go after his rivals. Some have talked about leaving the country. Others say they're speaking to lawyers and trying to prepare for whatever might be next. Sarah McCammon, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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