On Tuesday, the Associated Press reported, “The Alaska Republican Party has censured U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski for voting to convict former President Donald Trump at his impeachment trial and now doesn’t want her to identify as a GOP candidate in next year’s election.”
Besides her anti-Trump vote and frequent criticism of the former president, the Alaska GOP also faulted the senator, who has been in office since 2002, for voting for President Joe Biden’s choice for Interior Department secretary, who opposes resource development on public lands.
And its “resolution also cited Murkowski’s opposition to placing limits on abortion, voting against repeal of the federal Affordable Care Act, voicing opposition to the appointment of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh and her speaking critically of Trump and demanding Trump’s resignation after the riot at the Capitol,” the AP noted.
In addition, the document, which was adopted by a 53-17 margin, “directed party leadership to recruit a candidate to run in the Alaska primary in 2022, when Murkowski is up for re-election.”
“The party does not want Lisa Murkowski to be a Republican candidate,” a former GOP state chairman told the AP.
Murkowski becomes the fifth Republican senator who voted to convict Trump for his alleged role in the tragic Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol to be sanctioned by the folks back home.
As in Alaska, state-level Republicans in Louisiana and North Carolina have formally censured Sens. Bill Cassidy and Richard Burr, respectively.
Feelings ran hot against alleged turncoats elsewhere but did not go as far as they did in Alaska, North Carolina, and Louisiana.
In Pennsylvania, Sen. Pat Toomey has been censured by county-level party activists, including in his hometown, for voting to convict Trump.
In Nebraska, the state GOP rejected censure but expressed its “deep disappointment and sadness” with Sen. Ben Sasse in a resolution that covered other issues, with his treatment of Trump being only part of their discontent.
In Maine, state party officials also stopped short of censure, issuing a letter to Sen. Susan Collins saying they “vehemently disagree with your vote on this matter (impeachment) and condemn it in the strongest possible terms.”
Only Utah Sen. Mitt Romney has escaped any punishment.
The party there noted that it appreciated the state’s senators’ “diversity of thought.” Unlike Romney, Sen. Mike Lee voted to acquit Trump.
Back in Alaska, Trump had said earlier this month that he would personally work to defeat Murkowski if she ran for re-election.
“I will not be endorsing, under any circumstances, the failed candidate from the great State of Alaska, Lisa Murkowski,” the 45th president said in a statement.
“She represents her state badly and her country even worse. I do not know where other people will be next year, but I know where I will be — in Alaska campaigning against a disloyal and very bad Senator.”
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