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Posted on 03/01/2021 8:37:56 PM PST by lightman
A sharply-split Republican State Committee in Pennsylvania voted Monday night to again express its displeasure with Sen. Pat Toomey’s vote last month to convict former President Donald J. Trump on an article of impeachment, but stopped short of voting to censure him.
Committee members were given the choice of voting for a statement proposed by Chairman Lawrence Tabas that “strongly rebukes but does not censure” Toomey, and a second statement that does censure him.
The censure movement was blocked by a narrow 128-124 margin, with 13 abstentions, according to a source who had been briefed on the results.
The difference is essentially a matter of severity in the reprimand: neither option carried any real teeth with regard to Toomey’s office or standing within the party. The second-term senator from the Allentown area has already announced his intent to leave the Senate at the end of his current term in 2022.
But some members of the committee - and the broader party membership - who hope to see the party steer away from blind devotion to the former president with gubernatorial and U.S. Senate races on the horizon in Pennsylvania next year may see the lesser rebuke as a small sign of progress.
The state party organization had not issued any statement in the wake of the Monday’s final tally as of publication of this post. The top vote-getter in Monday’s count was also said to include criticisms of Gov. Tom Wolf and other Democrats.
Toomey was one of seven Republican senators to vote to convict Trump for incitement of his supporters to riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, as Trump was in the death throes of his attempt to block the final tabulation of President Joseph R. Biden’s national electoral college win.
In doing so, Toomey was part of a 57-43 majority that fell 10 votes short of the two-thirds threshold needed to convict.
Midstate members of the state GOP committee seemed to reflect the overall split.
County Republican committees in York and Adams counties, for example, have already passed their own censure resolutions, and other local groups have similar votes pending.
But other midstate committee members like state Rep. Sue Helm, of Dauphin County, said Monday the infighting makes no sense to her. “Instead of wasting our time on this,” Helm told PennLive, “I think we should be looking for a new and good candidate for when he (Toomey) isn’t going to run in two years.”
Monday’s vote seeks to wrap up a discussion launched in a virtual meeting last Wednesday that ended without a completed vote after the platform that the committee was using crashed.
The censure vote had been seen differently by different groups.
To some, it was like an exhibition season for the fights ahead in 2022, as the party tries to settle on nominees for an open gubernatorial and Senate races, and - in a larger sense - its post-Trump direction.
Others saw it simply as those who are in firm control of the party at the moment having their say on a matter of internal party politics. They are counting on the future acts of President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and his thin Democratic Party majorities in Congress to help reunite the party in the longer run.
Still‚ some members went on record in advance of last week’s private discussion to express concerns about the effort to punish Toomey alienating another slice of existing party members and making it harder to reach new ones.
“The Republican Party needs unity, not a purge,” Joseph DiSarro, a political science professor at Washington & Jefferson College in southwestern Pennsylvania, who also happens to be a member of the Republican State Committee, told PennLive last month. “The last thing the party needs is a discussion of who is a true Republican, and who is a RINO,” DiSarro said, using the acronym for Republican-In-Name-Only.
Pennsylvania Ping!
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And once again, Republicans fail to come through. It is a definite pattern.
Yup, a couple of stones short of a pair.
A Censure does not really change anything professionally for the recipient, does it? Just a “Sternly worded note has now placed in your career files!” The deeds have already been done and cannot be undone. Didn’t CheneyDottir-Liz get such a Censure as well? You can see how concerned she is about it
—NOT!
Yes, it does need a purge of RINOs from leadership. The party is going nowhere with those dickweeds in charge.
We ddn’t want Demo-lite.
Mittens 2012 was a disaster and has been a fustercluck ever since.
The censure movement was blocked by a narrow 128-124 margin, with 13 abstentions, according to a source who had been briefed on the results.
So they voted to "rebuke" but not to"censure"?
Is there really a difference? Aren't they both just verbal criticisms?
He was a cluster back when he threw the 1994 Massachusetts senate election to Ted Kennedy. He out abortion righted and gay righted the Tedster in the final debate. He was ahead and went into freefall.
Toothless tigers by any other name...
The 2012 “choice” was between Øbama and Øbama-lite.
https://theprecinctproject.wordpress.com/
We need to fill the vacant Committemen slots with those who support TRUMPISM.
Pennsylvania conservatives should sit on their hands next election - or vote for the Democrat.
Pathetic
I’m going to have to read up on censuring.
Thirteen cowards.
Basically 13 cowards afraid to offend anyone.
Oh my, there are good arguments on both sides. I just don’t know. I’ll just have to sit this one out.
Just like Obama back in the Illinois Senate. They can’t be bothered to know what the issues are and they can’t take a side.
They could have expressed their displeasure, reprimanded him, issued a reproach, admonished him, chastised him, or rebuked him. But I would have liked to see them thoroughly castigate him.
Good luck in the 2020 elections Pennsylvania. If you are not interested in identifying and purging RINO’s, you are NOT true Republicans and there’s little reason to vote for your RINOs.
Hé was also admonished.
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