Los senadores republicanos apoyan a Thune en respuesta a los ataques de Trump al líder

Senate Republicans are rallying behind Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S. D.) after President Trump declined to support the GOP leader serving another term following the midterm election. Many Republican senators say Thune will have their full support, even if Trump backs a challenger because of the Senate leader’ s refusal to abolish the filibuster to advance Trump’ s top legislative priorities, such as the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE America) Act. “ There’ s a lot of respect for John Thune. There’ s a lot of recognition of how he works and how difficult his job is and a belief that he’ s doing it really well under difficult circumstances,” said Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.). Moran said that Republican senators have been willing to yield to the president on a lot of issues but that they would draw a line against letting Trump push Thune out of his job or pick a replacement. “ I also think there are some things where the Senate seems willing to accede their privileges, but I think who our leader is, there’ s a real sense that that belongs to us,” he said. Even Senate conservatives who have ratcheted up pressure on Thune to keep the upper chamber in session during the August recess to debate the SAVE America Act acknowledge that Thune has had to navigate a political minefield as GOP leader. “ It’ s a hard job, it’ s really a hard job,” said Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), a leading proponent of the SAVE America Act. Asked if he continues to have confidence in Thune given the growing criticism from the White House, Scott noted that presidents often get frustrated with the Senate’ s 60-vote hurdle to passing their legislative priorities. “ I’ m sure if I were president of the United States, I would be frustrated if everything I wanted didn’ t get done. So that’ s probably pretty common,” the Florida senator said. Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said he’ s doesn’ t “ know of any movements to replace” Thune even though Trump has repeatedly expressed frustration over his agenda getting bogged down in the Senate. “ I think the president and John like each other. I think these are tough issues and they obviously disagree over things like the filibuster,” Kennedy said. Trump last week insisted in an interview with Punchbowl News that Republican voters are “ not angry at me, but they are angry at Republicans” in Congress. But even Trump’ s allies on Capitol Hill aren’ t buying that claim. “ I think Republicans are angry at all of us, I mean the voters. I think the voters are angry period. And I think they’ re angry most about … cost of living, and I think that’ s what this election is going to be primarily about,” Kennedy said. “ One of the reasons that the democratic socialists are winning elections is because they stand for something. Now what they stand for sucks, but a lot of their support is coming from young people who don’ t know history,” the Louisiana senator continued. GOP lawmakers think Trump has caused political headwinds for their party by not being more attuned to the affordability crisis, which Trump downplayed as a “ hoax” issue driven by Democrats. And while Trump has traveled around the country to talk about his economic accomplishments, he is prone to veering away from h