Pennsylvania Republicans weigh the party's future post-Trump

Republicans and party leaders are wondering what direction the GOP in Pennsylvania will take in the era of the post-Trump presidency and in the wake of the attack on the U.S. Capitol by an angry mob of President Trump’s supporters.

Will the party return to its more moderate roots as the home of figures such as Dick Thornburgh, John Heinz and Tom Ridge? Or will it remain swept up in the populist surge that Trump rode to the White House in 2016?

Or will the two branches of a party that appears seriously splintered finally agree to a divorce?

Elected officials and party leaders said nothing is written in stone just yet.

“It’s a work in progress,” said Scott Avolio, a Westmoreland County lawyer and member of the Pennsylvania GOP State Committee. He insisted the events of Wednesday, when rioters stormed the Capitol after a Trump rally, are in no way a reflection on the party as a whole.

“It’s an unfortunate event, and the stories behind it are still unfolding,” Avolio said.

He predicted it will have no effect on the party’s growing prominence in Southwestern Pennsylvania.

Trump loyalists — including Reps. Mike Kelly of Butler, Guy Reschenthaler of Peters and John Joyce of Blair County, and state Senate Majority Leader Kim Ward of Hempfield — were quick to condemn the violence.

But they remained mum on the conduct of the president who fomented it and prospects for his continuing influence on the GOP.

Nonetheless, just days after the party lost control of the U.S. Senate and news outlets around the world flashed images of the Capitol under siege, Trump appeared to continue to hold significant influence with party leaders. Members of the Republican National Committee cheered Thursday morning when Trump called in during a breakfast at their annual winter meeting, The New York Times reported.

Former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett wasn’t surprised.

For four years, he watched as the populist wave that ushered in the era of Trump grew, and establishment Republicans tolerated it to reap Trump’s policy gains. That acceptance seemed to end Wednesday. There was little question, Corbett said, that Trump sent an angry mob marching toward the Capitol.

“For the last four years, it hasn’t been the Republican Party. It’s been the Trump party. He basically convinced people he was right, and they ignored his behavior, which was bad, and took his policy,” Corbett said. “Nationally, the party is going to have to find a way to come together.”

State Sen. Camera Bartolotta of Monongahela was among Trump’s local supporters. She said she voted for him and is disappointed he lost. She said it is wrong to judge a party or any group by its extremists.

Going forward, she would like to see the party focus on energy independence and rebuilding the economy that has crumbled during the pandemic shutdowns.

“But as Republicans, we need to remember to remind people that 74 million people voted for Donald Trump for a second term. That’s a lot of people, and their voices won’t be silenced,” the Washington County Republican said. “The Republican Party has been around since the 1850s, and it wasn’t based on one person at one period of time. It was based on ideals; it was based on anti-slavery, freedom and rights for everyone.

”Donald Trump is not the be-all and end-all definition of what the Republican Party is.”

Ward said the party today is of the “hardworking middle class.”

“I believe we will continue on that path standing against the liberal progressive elites,” she said. “It’s not so much that the Republican Party has moved right, because our platform hasn’t changed all that much. We have always been pro-Second Amendment, pro-life, low taxes and less government. It’s more that the people calling the shots in the Democrat Party have taken that party to the far left fringes of the spectrum. “

Some Republicans hope their party will abandon its strident populist leanings and revert to its conservative fiscal and social roots.

“We’re in a mess,” said Joe DiSarro, chair of the political science department at Washington & Jefferson College and a member of the Pennsylvania GOP State Committee. “I think the Trump era is going to be over soon. Once the new president is inaugurated, the new Congress is sworn in along with the two new (Georgia) senators, I think it will return to being the party of Lincoln, the party of Reagan.”

Allegheny County Councilman and Republican Committee Chair Sam DeMarco said some of the newer party members attracted solely by Trump may fade away. But he predicted the party that has outstripped Democrats in gains in recent years will continue to flourish.

“But the party is a big tent,” DeMarco said. “It includes members from the establishment and those who got involved only in support of President Trump. … Where’s the party going to go? We’re going to see. But I think anyone who thinks the terrible events of Wednesday are going to destroy the Republican Party is completely wrong.”

Others were less charitable, including some of the elder statesmen of the Pennsylvania GOP.

“I think that the Republican Party has been damaged very badly,” said former Allegheny County GOP leader Jim Roddey. “I don’t know if it’s beyond repair, whether it can survive. (Wednesday) was a dark day, one of the darkest in our history.

“I’m 88 years old. I grew up in the Depression, but I didn’t experience anything like that.”

Roddey speculated that fear of running against Trump’s base in Southwestern Pennsylvania has kept state and local officials from speaking out against the outgoing president.

Charlie Dent, the former eastern Pennsylvania Republican who resigned midway through his seventh term in 2018, has been an outspoken Trump critic since 2017. A fixture in Pennsylvania politics since his election to the state House in 1990, Dent is a frequent commentator on CNN.

The former congressman, who endorsed Joe Biden in August, was horrified by the spectacle that unfolded in Washington on Wednesday.

“The party has evolved,” he said. “The first vote I cast was for Dick Thornburgh as governor.”

Dent said he identifies with a long string of moderate Pennsylvania Republicans, including figures such as Thornburgh, Heinz, Ridge and Bill Scranton. He’s appalled with the conspiracy theorists and QAnon adherents who populate the party these days.

He said the party must abandon Trumpism if it is to flourish.

“What do we do now as a party?” Dent said. “The party needs to become much more socially tolerant and inclusive. Reject this cronyism and protectionism, embrace free markets and have answers and policy solutions on issues like climate change and immigration.”