There are roughly two dozen House Republicans who, based on the midterm results or their districts’ makeup, are likely to face difficult re-election battles in 2024. While these Republicans typically get far less attention than the party’s anti-democratic extremists — those who praise autocrats like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and spread former President Donald Trump’s false claims about the 2020 election — they potentially have far more leverage.
That’s because moderate Republicans could undermine the GOP’s slim House majority by reaching across the aisle to work with Democrats. Extremists, for all their bluster, have no such option.
The narrow GOP majority means moderate Republicans could exercise their influence to press for centrist priorities that could help them with voters in 2024. But their leverage will only be helpful if they choose to take advantage of it. In recent years, the majority of House Republicans, fearful of being labeled Republican in Name Only, have allowed the party’s extremist fringe represented by the likes of Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz and Jim Jordan to intimidate them.
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That’s increasingly looking like a risky electoral strategy. As we learned in the midterms, voters in closely divided districts tended to reject the anti-democratic inclinations of candidates backed by former President Trump. In a tightly divided legislative chamber, any small group from the majority party can cause disruption by threatening “no”...
Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei is in "good health" and suffered only minor injuries during the February 28 strikes, senior Iranian officials said on Friday, dismissing mounting speculation...