Hypothetical question: If Trump is found guilty of a crime regarding the classified documents, will it hurt the Republican party?

If Trump is found guilty, the republicans will find some rationale to make excuses for him, and threaten to kill all judges and dismantle the court system.

Guys, the republican party in 2022 is a dangerous cult.

It would help.

If he’s found guilty of anything (so many to choose from), they will simply move forward with another candidate.
Trump may endorse this person as he did this summer, and we’ll see how the cases turn out in time.
The only concern is if anything can be proven quickly that disqualifies him from running.

If he’s disqualified, that’s when the possibility of conspiracy theorists and Alt Right to act out.
Either way the show will go on, with or without him. People are so polarized there will be few undecided imo.

In my opinion it won’t hurt the Republican Party.

I agree with @hat . The Republican party is founded on the idea that the government is the problem. Including the president. The more Trump screws up the more it strengthens the opinion that the government is the problem. Which strengthens the cause.

Having classified documents is a small crime compared to trying to stage a coup, which hasn’t done any damage to the Republican party or to Trump. I don’t think it would make a difference.

They’re Ofdonalds.

It will hurt Trump but not the Republicans.

Moscow Mitch will declare the Tangerine Turd was NEVER a Republican . . . so much for logic and Mitch is missing more than a bag full of marbles !

Agree with @elbanditoroso, it is a cult. The Repubs will have no more problem with Trump than the Branch Davidians had with David Koresh or the people in Guyana had with Jim Jones. Just drink the Kool Aide peeps, obey the leader regardless of the cost. I really am afraid that the GOP has come down to that level.

@Tropical_Willie Moscow Mitch won’t be able to deny that the Republicans made Trump sign a piece of paper saying Trump would abide by the wishes/ideals of the Republican party.

No enemy of the Republican party could so successfully engineer its wreckage to destruction as skilfully as Donald J Trump. In fact, by now, it no longer matters to the party’s reputation or credibility how Trump behaves. The upcoming, prosecutions, scandals, convictions, etc.must grow ever less sensational with the sheer boredom from their monotonous and endless repetition. The party itself is like a stumbling gunshot victim that has not yet understood the extent or lethality of his wounds. Trump has plugged the guy like no assassin could get away with.

@kritiper such a paper would by now be little more than a meaningless joke. The party no longer can claim any values or ideals beyond rampant stupidity and naked crass self aggrandizement.

Not to any meaningful degree, if at all.
They will just ignore, deny, deflect, spin, lie, project. Just look at the past:

- Was shown to have colluded with Russia: cons call it a hoax.
– Extorting Ukraine, impeached, even some reps admitting that he was guilty: complete denial.
– Complete Covid Botch Job: calling it a hoax, complaining about masks, concocting conspiracy theories about chinese bioweapons, weaponising antivaxxers
– tried to commit election fraud by attempting to pressure states to throw out Biden votes, or invent Trump votes out of thin air, so he could win. Tried to make Pence illegaly discard certified state electors and instead count fake electors. Launched dozens of frivolous lawsuits that he naturally lost, with his “elite strike force kraken lawyers” being sanctioned for malfeasance : claim that it was the democrats that perpetrated the fraud, and the courts are just biased, or are conspiring with the democrats
– incited an insurrectionist mob to violently stop the certification of the results, tried to have metal detectors removed, because he knew the mob was armed: claim that it was simultaneously an “antifa” false flag attack, and that it was a “peaceful” demonstration and “legitimate political discourse”.

If the Orangutan gets convicted, and that is still a big “if”, they will call it a show trial in a kangaroo court, and whine about buttery males.
They are already calling it a “witch hunt”.

I think that the Republicans will lose all credibility since common sense was lacking as the whole world watched it go down the rabbit hole to its doom.

Will it hurt the party? All the sentiment before such a potential conviction…the independent vote this mid-term would be a great indicator of that sentiment.

Trump and the SCOTUS overturning Roe v Wade have SCREWED the GOP for the foreseeable future.

Trump only hurts Republicans so IMO this would shift the party away from the nutty side back into more reality.

@HP Nevertheless, the paper was signed. The Republicans wanted it that way, and stressed it exuberantly. But, as two-faced as the Republicans are, (AKA Mitch McConnell), it wouldn’t surprise me if they poo-pooed the paper now.

It was a dog and pony attempt at polishing the party’s tarnished and crap stained image. It is a handy scrap of paper for the Dems to wave in the FALL campaigns as the GOP bumper crop of candidates screaming about Biden’s ” illegitimate” Presidency. McConnel is increasingly concerned about Republican prospects with a nationwide slate of Marjorie Taylor Green knucklehead clones.

The Republicans were the ones waving it around. Biden and the Democrats had nothing to do with it, didn’t even and have never mentioned it.

In the Fall campaign when the Gaetz/Green zombie clones infest the Republican ranks of candidates running for office, the Dems would be crazy to neglect waving around that pledge about Republican “ldeals” to be compared with the pronouncements of maga candidates.

It would be of no consequence to the Democrats at all. Everybody knows what the Republicans are all about, so why would the Democrats want to worry themselves about some paper Trump signed to promise he would stand by the Republican platform? The idea makes no sense.