(RepublicanNews.org) – Lisa Murkowski, the Republican senator who has retained her Alaskan seat since 2002, has indicated that she may soon part ways with her party over ideological differences. Murkowski has found herself at odds with many in the GOP throughout her career and has now become the second member of her party to refuse to support presumptive presidential pick Donald Trump.
Murkowski previously offered her public endorsement of Nikki Haley’s doomed campaign and at the same time affirmed her refusal to get behind Trump should he end up on the ballot in the November presidential election. Murkowski went on to say that she regretted that the Republican party had apparently become “the party of Trump” and chided those in the party she deemed “extremist, populist” conservatives who she believes prevent others from taking the GOP seriously. When questioned by the press as to whether she would prefer to run as an Independent, she replied that she had always been “very independent-minded,” although did not say for certain what her plans were.
The long-time Alaskan senator has never shied away from standing apart from her GOP colleagues, voting against Brett Kavanaugh’s 2018 nomination to the Supreme Court and in favor of Ketanji Brown Jackson’s nomination in 2022. Although she did not vote to impeach Trump in his first impeachment trial, she publicly disagreed with Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell’s promise to work “in total coordination” with then-President Trump and his team, saying that she and her colleagues should not align themselves so closely with the defense, but should try to keep a sense of impartiality. She was outspoken in her criticism of Donald Trump in the wake of the January 6th riot in 2021, calling for his resignation just two days later, later joining six other Republican senators in voting to impeach him.
While Murkowski has at times been in the minority within her party, she claims that she is far from alone with her current discomfort, saying that “rational Republicans” keep approaching her to share their own, similar concerns about remaining with the GOP.
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