It's Your Constitutionally Suspended Sunday Show Rundown!

We watch the Sunday shows so you never have to.

The depths to which the Republican Party will go to follow Donald Trump never fail to surprise.

Yes, he won the 2016 presidential election on a technicality and was the ideal Grover Norquist executive . But he also cost the GOP the 2018 midterms, the 2020 presidential election, and the 2022 midterms. In a simple "wins versus losses" chart, Trump has been a failure.

That, however, has not stopped the GOP from sinking further on the Sunday shows.

Media Needs To Stop Being So Shocked At This

Appearing on ABC's "This Week", Republican congressman Dave Joyce was asked about Trump's unhinged call to suspend the Constitution. While Joyce tried to do the "we are not looking into the past" pivot, George Stephanopoulos's follow-up question really tripped him up. 

“Pressed by @GStephanopoulos on if he would support Donald Trump despite Trump's calls for suspending the Constitution, Rep. Dave Joyce says: “I’ll support whoever the Republican nominee is." "I just don’t think at this point he’ll be able to get there.” https://t.co/O7WBX2ZVKY”

— This Week (@This Week) 1670165866 

Joyce refusing to say he will not endorse Trump if he wins the nomination while hoping for a better candidate is a good example of how we got here in the first place. The infuriating part is the media's shock that the GOP has become this. Yes, it should be "remarkable," as Stephanopoulos stated. But you can only be shocked at the gambling in Casablanca so many times before it's either naivete or willful ignorance on the media's part.

This is who the GOP is.

Joyce tried to use a variation of one of the GOP's earliest and flimsiest excuses for Trump:

JOYCE: Well, you know, he says a lot of things that -- but that doesn’t mean that it’s ever going to happen. So you’ve got to accept exact fact from fantasy. And fantasy is that we’re going to suspend the Constitution and go backwards. We're moving forward and we're going to continue to move forward as a Republican majority and as a Republican conference.

The media should have held Trump and GOP to the same standard they hold everyone else.

Allowing them to pretend he and the GOP shouldn't be taken literally is why the media is always shocked when they do exactly what they said they'd do.

Hate The Insurrection, Not The Insurrectionist Enablers

Republican congressman-elect Mike Lawler of New York is already showing he can split the difference of gently criticizing Trump without truly criticizing Trump:

When asked about Trump's idea to just discard the Constitution, Lawler gave a very sane yet mild response ...

LAWLER: Well, obviously, I don't support that. The Constitution is set for a reason, to protect the rights of every American. And so I certainly don't endorse that language or that sentiment.

... until he quickly pivoted to a familiar talking point.

LAWLER: I think the question for everyone is how we move forward. I ran for Congress to address the challenges that we're facing and be forward-looking. Frankly, I think people are tired of looking backwards. I think people are tired of discussing the grievances of prior elections. And they want to know what we're going to do to address the challenges.

The GOP's desire to only be forward-looking about ignoring Donald Trump truly gives off divorced dad energy. But this is the former president and current 2024 frontrunner for the GOP presidential nomination, who incited and ignore a coup attempt in his name, demanding he be installed as a dictator. This isn't criticizing voter suppression or gerrymandering. It's the leader of the Republican Party calling for an authoritarian solution.

But good try! That guy will fit right in with the current Republican caucus.

Have a week.

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