It’s time for Republicans to play offense while Democrats are weak

Bravo, Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.). Last Tuesday, he became the first member of Congress to give a full-throated rebuke of Democrats who continue to peddle the Russian collusion fairytale through innuendo, suggestion, and “baseless allegations.”

He’s right. For months, an unjustifiably emboldened Democratic Party has dominated the friendly airwaves of TV news with tales of closed-door hearings and secret evidence that would make Franz Kafka blush.

{mosads}Consider the back-and-forth between ABC’s Martha Raddatz and Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) last Sunday, in which she conceded, “I know you can’t talk about the evidence,” and he said that he “can’t go into the particulars of our closed investigation.”

Yet, the cloak-and-dagger discussion came to the foregone conclusion that there seemed to be enough evidence that Russia “has something that they can hang over the head of our president or our administration.” This is the type of interview, filled with ambiguity and insinuation, that’s been running in a continuous loop over the last several months — more frequently than reruns of Seinfeld.

Thankfully, Gowdy isn’t the only one correcting the record. He was joined on Thursday by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who went as far as accusing Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) of lying to the press, saying “even after Mr. Comey told the gang of eight that the president was not under investigation, the minority leader told the media that the president was under investigation and of course that further help feed media storm hysteria.”

Perhaps it shouldn’t be so surprising that there are signs like this that the GOP is beginning to change its posture. As The Art of War reminds us, we should avoid what is strong and strike at what is weak. Clearly, the Democratic Party has been debilitated by their fifth consecutive special election defeat after spending more than $30 million to lose by a wider margin than predicted.

Their bosses are on the ropes. There is now an open discussion within their caucus of forcing House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) resignation, while the DNC leadership resorts to potty mouth language to stay relevant in the media. Even their staunchest allies like Michael Moore are forced to admit that the party has “no message, no plan, no leaders.”

This begs the obvious question: if the GOP is not going to go on the attack now, then when? Thankfully, it seems like the party is rising to the task. There is clear pushback on both the collusion and obstruction ideas, as Senate Republicans are gearing up to look into Loretta Lynch’s potential Hillary Clinton investigation cover-up, and members of the House Freedom Caucus have called for a special counsel to investigate former FBI Director James Comey and Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s “unequal justice.”

Republicans are also trying to aggressively reshape the narrative surrounding healthcare reform. No longer are they sitting on their hands while the debate is allowed to revolve around how the “party of death” is taking away people’s health insurance.

Instead, the message is clear: ObamaCare is failing. Insurers are pulling out. The Democrats left us flawed system, and the GOP is offering a better plan. Outside Washington, Republicans are starting to see something that has been missing since the height of the Tea Party movement in 2010: an activist base. Call it what you will, though most prefer “New Right.” On Sunday, hundreds of its activists staged a rally outside of the White House in support of free speech and against violent rhetoric in politics.

There’s a debate in the GOP over whether this movement is good for the party, with the #NeverTrumpers and Weekly Standard-types in one camp, and the populist, Trump loyalists in the other. Whatever your opinion, the growing social media presence and book sales of those associated with the New Right discredits any notion of its irrelevance within Republican ranks.

Frankly, most Republicans chuckled, even those that didn’t wholly condone, the incident in Central Park where activists briefly took the stage to protest a Shakespearean rendition that alluded to the murder of President Trump. For many, it was simply a case of the left, which has been known for using violence to stop conservative speakers, getting a tiny taste of its own medicine.

More organically, there have been hundreds of similar demonstrations around the country in support of the president or against the left, ranging from a protest against Hollywood elitism at the Oscars, to a sit in at a Starbucks where a woman was mocked for her Trump tee shirt. Republican leadership must see this as a sign that there is some blood pumping in the veins of the party base once again.

Taken as a whole, this moment seems to be the clearest opening for the GOP to reposition itself on its front foot. There may not be another opportunity when Republicans in Congress, like Gowdy, and a host of grassroots activists are willing to take up the fight and push back against the “resist” agenda of the Democrats. The party would be wise to not squander it.

Joseph Borelli is a New York City council member, professor, former state legislator, Republican commentator, and Lindsay Fellow at the Institute for State and Local Governance at City University of New York. He has been published in the New York Daily News and appears on CNN, BBC, and Fox News. You can follow him on Twitter @JoeBorelliNYC.

The opinions expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Institute for State and Local Governance at City University of New York.

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