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It has become a clich to declare that Republicans and Democrats live in two different worlds these days, but it turns out there is some truth to the observation.

New research on political behavior finds that most Democratic and Republican voters live in partisan bubbles, with little daily exposure to those who belong to the other party. For instance the typical Democrat has almost zero interactions with Republicans in their neighborhood, according to an article by Harvard doctoral student Jacob R. Brown and government Professor Ryan D. Enos published March 8 in the journal Nature Human Behaviour.

Theres a lot of evidence that any separation between groups has a lot of negative consequences. We see this in race; we see this in religion; we see this in all kinds of things, said Enos. And increasingly, we see this in partisanship in the United States.

Using geolocation data and the exact addresses of all 180 million registered voters in the U.S. as of June 2018, the two were able to precisely map, for the first time, where Democrats and Republicans live in relation to each other in every town, city, and state in the U.S. Then, rather than rely on the usual precinct or data aggregations, they used weighted measures and recorded the distance between voters to show how people are divided by geography and partisanship across the country.

No area of the country is immune to the segregation, but its intensity varies. Democrats in large, densely populated cities like New York are the most politically isolated, with 10 percent of them encountering a Republican only one out of 10 times in their neighborhood. Republicans in rural areas are similarly segregated.

Overall, most Democrats and Republicans live in levels of partisan segregation that exceed what scholars of racial segregation consider highly segregated, the study found.

Their analysis of U.S. Census tract data showed that 98 to 99 percent of Americans live in areas segregated by partisanship. Loving County, Texas, a county of about 200 people along the New Mexico border, is the only tract in the entire U.S. where Democrats and Republicans mix freely, the researchers found.

This social splitting is not the result of an urban/rural divide, where cities attract more Democrats, and Republicans typically favor the country life, Brown and Enos say. Whether in small to mid-size cities, the suburbs or ex-urbs in between, the data showed that Republicans stick close to other Republicans, and Democrats stick close to other Democrats.

Even within a neighborhood, Democrats and Republicans are separating from each other a little bit, said Enos. That seems like an almost unnatural level of segregation given the similarities people from the same neighborhood usually share and might indicate theres something pretty pernicious going on, he added.

Race and ethnicity are closely associated with partisanship and do affect where people live. The study shows, however, that partisan segregation is distinct from racial and ethnic segregation. White Democrats who do not identify as Hispanic had similar levels of exposure to members of the other political party as white Republicans, levels that were greater than Democrats from other racial and ethnic groups, who are the most isolated. Since non-Hispanic whites are more likely to be Republicans than Democrats, their lower rate of partisan segregation among whites, when race and ethnicity are taken into account, is suggestive evidence that white voters cluster with other whites regardless of party, according to the study.

If white people were more willing to live near non-white people, partisan segregation would be even higher, said Enos.

High levels of partisan segregation pose a number of negative consequences for democracy, the researchers say. Exposure to different sociopolitical ideas and viewpoints has long been shown to reduce prejudice and to improve social cooperation. Not only does partisan segregation help fuel a never-ending cycle of legislative stalemates, it affects whether voters, and the policy choices made on their behalf, are accurately and fairly represented in government, as heavily gerrymandered congressional districts already demonstrate.

Even within a neighborhood, Democrats and Republicans are separating from each other a little bit.

Ryan D. Enos

I would hope that we can all agree that its important that we get exposed to different ideas. We can reject them. We can do whatever we want, but its good that we hear both sides, said Enos.

Brown and others have found evidence that people engage in most of their political communication with people in own neighborhoods. The self-reinforcing nature of partisan isolation can easily open the door to extreme views and radicalized behavior, so the views of our neighbors really matter.

When you have things like ideology and party and geography all lining up on top of each other, on top of race and income and a lot of other things, these parties really, really start to matter for people, and can result in events like the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, said Enos.

What causes this segregation, what are the consequences and how it can be undone are among the many questions that scholars hope to be able to answer eventually. Unlike racial segregation, the field is still in its infancy, so much more work needs to be done before any definitive conclusions can be drawn fairly, said Brown and Enos.

The pair are now studying several related issues, including an examination of U.S. voter data from 2012 to 2020, to understand the trend and its effects over time, and digging into the effects such segregation has on peoples views, especially those in the out party for their area, as part of a broad project on partisan segregation.

For those Democrats in major metropolises like Manhattan or Chicago, or even smaller cities like Boston, who are stunned that they and not folks living in less-cosmopolitan confines like the suburban Midwest could be the most politically segregated voters in the country, it can be easy to lose sight of how blue most urban ZIP codes are when immersed in a racially diverse or multicultural environment.

I live in Harvard Square, and I think, as urban high-density Democrats, we tend to think we are surrounded by all this diversity, and in a way we are, said Enos. But we live in real, real homogenous political environments, and it is important to think about what the implications of that are for our views on the world.

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Democrats and Republicans live in partisan bubbles, study finds - Harvard Gazette

MANKATO, Minnesota (AP) Mary McGaw grew up in a Republican home on the rural prairie of south central Minnesota. But as she moved from her tiny town of Amboy to the nearest city of Mankato to study nursing, her politics migrated, too.

McGaw was moved by the plight of underinsured and became concerned about the viability of safety programs. She cast her vote for Democrat Joe Biden in November, and three months later she is pleased with how hard the new president is fighting for his priorities.

Hes trying to get something done, even though theres pushback from all sides, said the 37-year-old registered nurse, who now works at a Mankato branch of the Mayo Clinic.

Counties that went Bidens way in 2020 after favoring Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton in 2016 tend to be home to universities or large medical centers that draw educated and racially diverse newcomers. Their economies are better than average.

McGaws transformation is driving Democrats hopes as they charge into what the party considers its new frontier: small-city America.

As Democrats continue to lose votes in small towns, theyve seen clear gains in regional hubs that dot stretches of rural America. Biden carried roughly 60 counties President Donald Trump won in 2016, many were places anchored by a midsize or small city that is trending Democratic. They include places like Grand Rapids, Mich.; Wilmington, N.C.; Dayton, Ohio; and Mankatos Blue Earth County.

Their similarities are striking: Most include universities or, like Mankato, large medical centers that draw educated and racially diverse newcomers. Their economies are better than average. And in 2020, their voters showed a bipartisan streak voting for Biden for president and Republicans downballot in large numbers.

These voters are in line with Bidens personal brand, said Robert Griffin, research director for the Democracy Fund Voter Study Group, a bipartisan demographic and public opinion team. Hes pegged as a moderate Democrat, rightly. But hes also making sure theres room for moderation in the party.

Biden won Blue Earth County by 4.5 percentage points, about the same percentage Democrat Hillary Clinton lost it by in 2016. In November, voters in the area dumped 30-year Democratic Rep. Collin Peterson, arguably the most conservative Democrat in Congress, but reelected two Democratic state lawmakers.

Interviews with voters around Mankato help make sense of this partisan zigzagging.

While there remains support for Trump, voters stress that action carries more weight than ideological purity. Even devout Democratic activists who wish the new $1.9 trillion coronavirus aid package Bidens chief legislative accomplishment so far contained more arent frustrated.

See: Biden played Sheriff Joe role in rollout of 2009s recovery package this time around he is being cast as salesman-in-chief

Sure, I wish it had contained the $15 minimum wage, said Jim Hepworth, the areas Democratic chairman. But we can have that fight another day.

Blue Earth County has long swung back and forth in presidential elections. But the demographic trends are now steady in Democrats favor.

The expansion of the Mayo Clinic to Mankato from nearby Rochester in 1996 increased the supply of medical professionals from around the country and the world. Since 2010, healthcare jobs have increased in the county by roughly 70%.

About 40% of Mankato residents have college degrees a key indicator of Democratic voting compared with 33% nationwide.

Racial diversity has accelerated another boost for Democrats. Minnesota State University, Mankato, has drawn more international students to its expanded health care programs. And manufacturing and food-processing plants on the citys outskirts have attracted immigrants from North Africa and Latin America.

The transition has not been without tension, but the area has come a long way since Abdi Sabrie, a Somali-American member of the Mankato School Board, arrived in 2009.

Then, his two daughters were the only students of North African descent in their elementary school. Today, 28% of Mankatos enrollment are students of color.The changes are welcome, but Sabrie gets frustrated.

Sometimes I want Democrats to use their control to the max, regardless of the other side, he said. But this diversity shows me we can bring back the politics of collaboration.

Annual household income in Blue Earth rose by roughly $20,000 over the past decade to nearly $60,000 in February, still below the state average of $71,300. Blue Earth housing, too, has jumped from an average home price of roughly $140,000 to $226,000. Buoyed by health care, unemployment was 3.2% in January, up slightly from 2.6% a year ago. The states was 4.5% in January.

Signs of changes are easy to find.

A decade ago, hijabs were forbidden for Mayo employees. Today, the colored head coverings worn by some Muslim women are common on campus. The nations racial reckoning has played out in a debate over whether to rename Sibley Park, whose namesake is a general who ordered the hangings of 38 Dakota warriors in 1862, the largest mass execution in U.S. history.

From near that solemn spot along the Minnesota River, Mankato grew east to its wooded bluffs. Along the river, brick hulls of grain exchanges still stand but now so does Karshe, an East African tea shop, and the arty Fillin Station coffee house, among used bookstores, spas and brewpubs.

Midway up the slope, Mayos campus sits among the tidy, middle-class homes that made the difference for Biden. In that precinct, Biden netted 500 more votes than Clinton did in 2016, a third of his winning margin in the county.

Fetching her children from school, McGaw says she and her husband, a Spanish-language medical interpreter, felt Biden was more task-oriented and less about himself than Trump. She voted straight-ticket, but groused Peterson had become too conservative for the district.

McGaw said her family has lived modestly during the COVID-19 pandemic. They qualify for $2,800 in household aid, and another $2,800 in child tax credits. McGaw sees others are more needy.

Weve been doing OK, she said. I was never nervous about my job security. In fact, I was always asked to work more. Do we need the money? Honestly, we can do without it.

McGaw isnt necessarily typical. Nationally, 53% of Democrats say they have experienced at least one form of income loss during the pandemic, slightly more than the 43% of Republicans, according to a March poll by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

A few blocks away, retired office administrator Jaci Lageson said she was pleased with Bidens compromise with Senate moderates who wanted to lower the income threshold for those receiving the checks.

It gets money in the pockets of people who need it to survive, said Lageson, a 67-year-old former Republican who has voted Democratic over the past 20 years. Lagesons 73-year-old husband, Larry, a devoted Trump supporter, called Biden a pawn of Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

The number of counties Biden flipped in November is well short of the 206 Trump flipped from Barack Obama in 2016 proof partisanship has hardened across the U.S. But the Democratic trend in these smaller, well-educated pockets looks sustainable, researcher Griffin said.

Its not surprising to have higher-education areas shifting back to the Democrats, given that educational polarization has increased, he said.

Though Mankato remains among the smaller cities in this class, it has grown by 35% since 2000 to about 44,000.

The growth has turned this sleepy rural college island into a microcosm of Democratic America, mixed with pragmatic sensibility reflected in Elizabeth Van Slyke, a progressive willing to compromise.

Im not so dead set in my ways, the 57-year-old marketing executive said. Some progress in the right direction is better than no progress.

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What counties that flipped to Biden from Trump tell us about Democrats' pockets of renewed small-city vigor - MarketWatch

Former Attorney General during the Trump Administration, Ken Cuccinelli, returns to the Dom Giordano Program for a discussion about whats been done to further secure voter integrity moving forward after the controversial 2020 election, and to give his thoughts on issues of the border. This week, Joe Manchin was the first Democrat to step up and say that the situation at the border is a crisis. Cuccinelli explains that he vehemently agrees, and further explains what makes the situation so dire. Then, Cuccinelli explains what the Trump administration put in place in effort to prevent a surge at the border like were currently seeing, and explains why its become such an issue under the Biden administration. Then, Cuccinelli gives an update on the continued push by Republicans throughout the country to further ensure election security in the future.

Paris Dennard, Spokesperson for the GOP, returns to the Dom Giordano Program to discuss President Joe Bidens trip to the Philadelphia region, as he comes to Delaware County to tout his $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan. Dennard and Giordano first discuss why the President has to go on a tour to pump up the bill if its indeed as beneficial as hes making it out to be. Dennard mentions that if this bill was solely about COVID relief, they wouldnt have only 9% addressing COVID itself. Also, Dennard explains how the stimulus bill is a vessel to implement socialistic policies in the United States.

Harry Hurley, host on Atlantic Citys WPG Talk Radio, rejoins the Dom Giordano Program after breaking a huge story regarding Congressman Jeff Van Drew. For a while now, the Ocean City Sentinel has been publishing Op-Eds written by an Ocean City resident by the name of John McCall. In multiple columns, McCall has written violent threats and sexually harassed Van Drews wife. Then, McCall called Van Drew at his home and threatened the Congressman, saying, I will do everything in my power to ensure that you are deposed if not dead. Hurley spoke with the Congressman earlier in the day and got an update, which he reveals to our listeners, and gives some context surrounding the newspaper in question.

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Giordano: If These Threats Were Made Toward A Democrat Instead Of Van Drew, The World Would End - Talk Radio 1210 WPHT

Now it's Biden's turn, and so far his administration is signaling that judicial nominations will be a major priority and that Democrats may even tear pages from Trump's playbook on the issue.

There are 60 current eligible vacancies and 20 vacancies that will occur down the road as judges have formally announced their intentions to retire, take senior status or resign, according to the Administrative Office of the US Courts.

Biden has vowed to appoint the first Black woman to the Supreme Court, and even before his inauguration his transition team sent a letter to Democratic senators seeking recommendations for district court vacancies that might arise.

There is also an effort afoot to speed up the confirmation process by no longer allowing the American Bar Association to vet judicial candidates before they are nominated.

Some progressives, however, have legitimate concerns regarding whether the White House and the Senate will maintain the discipline and stamina necessary over the coming weeks and months to keep judges a priority as attention shifts to other areas.

They still remember that President Barack Obama came up short when faced with a similar opportunity early in his presidency, and they believe he squandered an opportunity to focus on the courts.

Chris Kang, chief counsel for the progressive group Demand Justice, believes things will be different now.

"President Biden's approach to judicial nominations is going to put the nail in the coffin of the conventional wisdom that Democrats don't care enough about the court," he said in an interview.

Pending vacancies

As things stand, since Biden's inauguration, judges sitting on powerful courts have already announced plans to go into senior status, giving the new President the chance to replace them with younger nominees.

Since Biden's inauguration there have been five announced vacancies on the appeals courts as well as a handful on district courts, and more are expected

Judge Robert A. Katzmann, for example, who penned an opinion that would have allowed Trump's tax records to go to a New York prosecutor, has announced plans to take senior status on the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals.

Another notable vacancy will come up once Judge Merrick Garland of the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit is confirmed as Biden's attorney general. Democrats haven't forgotten that Garland, nominated by Obama early in 2016 to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia, was denied a hearing by Senate Republicans, who simply sat on the nomination until the presidential election was over.

The DC Circuit is considered a breeding ground for Supreme Court nominees and served as a steppingstone for Chief Justice John Roberts, as well as Justices Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Scalia and Brett Kavanaugh.

High on the list of potential contenders is Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, who sits on the US District Court for the District of Columbia. She is a former Breyer clerk who also served as a public defender. California Supreme Court Justice Leondra Kruger is a potential nominee for Breyer's seat if he were to step down.

In addition, in the coming weeks, Biden is set to reveal the membership for a bipartisan commission that will take a look at revisions to the Supreme Court, including the potential of term limits and adding more seats to the bench.

How Trump and Senate Republicans transformed the courts

Under Trump, a careful troika composed of White House Counsel Don McGahn, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley worked immediately and almost seamlessly to change the face of the courts.

Democrats were livid and accused the Republicans at times of ignoring the rules in order to bulldoze the process, but with Republicans in the Senate majority all four years of the Trump presidency, the Democrats were unable to stop all but a handful of nominations.

The Republicans ran a closely held vetting operation, eased long-standing institutional norms and, perhaps most importantly, maintained forward momentum, avoiding distraction, as other issues blew up around the presidency.

The process -- no easy feat straddling three branches -- required discipline and outside backing. Under Trump, the conservative Federalist Society and later a group called The Article III Project were supportive of Trump's nominees.

"President Trump's biggest and most consequential accomplishment was his transformation of the federal judiciary, including his solidification of a conservative majority on the Supreme Court and his appointment of a near-record 54 circuit judges to the critically important federal courts of appeals," said Mike Davis, president of the Article III Project. "These lifetime appointments will provide an important constitutional check on government overreach by the Biden administration."

In the early Obama years, outside groups often disagreed on potential nominees and the political branches lacked a laser-like focus necessary to accompany a nominee to confirmation.

During the lead-up to the 2016 election, Trump made the Supreme Court and lower courts a campaign issue. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton rarely brought it up and some liberals squabbled over whether Garland should remain the Democratic pick.

After Trump won, Democrats found themselves helpless as they fought the onslaught of nomination hearings. They were largely sidelined as Justice Neil Gorsuch got the seat once offered to Garland, Kavanaugh won confirmation after perhaps the most ferocious nomination fight in history and conservatives rushed to fill the seat of the liberal icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg with the conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett. Ginsburg died some four months short of Biden's inauguration.

The Supreme Court now has a solid 6-3 conservative majority that could last for decades as issues such as abortion, immigration, affirmative action, religious liberty, voting rights and the Second Amendment reach the high court.

A final wake-up call for progressives came at the end of Barrett's confirmation hearing in October, when Democrats, still furious that Republicans had rushed deadlines in the run-up to the election, witnessed Judiciary Committee ranking member Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, hug Chairman Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, and praise him for his efforts during the hearings.

Then-Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, said he had had a "long and serious" talk with Feinstein. Progressives felt betrayed, and it wasn't long after that Feinstein announced she would step down as top Democrat on the committee.

The Democratic team

Now that Biden is in office, there's a new troika in town. White House Counsel Dana Remus, Schumer -- now the majority leader -- and Judiciary Chairman Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, are in place.

Brian Fallon, who runs Demand Justice, launched in 2018, is determined to keep the pressure on from outside of government. His group wants Biden's team to move away from recent models and nominate a diverse group of individuals including public defenders, civil rights lawyers and legal aid attorneys.

"They are upending the model of lawyers that Democratic presidents will consider for the judiciary. Prosecutors and corporate lawyers are out; civil rights lawyers, public defenders and labor lawyers are in," he said.

According to a Democratic aide on Capitol Hill, Durbin will follow the same rules that the Republicans did when the committee was led by Grassley and Graham. They expect to hold hearings at a regular clip and to put forward multiple nominees on any given hearing panel. There will be an emphasis on diversity but also, following Trump, they will look for young nominees who could serve for decades.

Although some questioned whether Congress will prioritize Justice Department nominees over judges, the aide dismissed the concern.

"There is time and there is precedent for moving DOJ nominees alongside of judicial nominees," the aide said.

"I have every reason to believe that the nominees you will see from this White House will be eminently qualified, which was not always true for nominees you saw put forward by Trump," the person added.

Momentum will also come from other quarters of the White House, starting most obviously with a President and vice president who both spent time serving on the Judiciary Committee, with Biden as its former chairman.

Klain is a veteran of countless confirmation hearings and a former clerk of Justice Byron White. Paige Herwig, a former top aide to former Attorney General Loretta Lynch as well as a veteran of the Senate Judiciary Committee and Demand Justice, will serve as the nominations counsel and will receive help from Tona Boyd, Sen. Cory Booker's former chief counsel.

As Biden concentrates on nominations, he will find that his policies and initiatives, like the immigration action temporarily struck by Judge Tipton, will land in the courts.

And while Trump's nominees did not always vote in his favor, a fact that was made clear as he fought to overturn the election, by and large his nominees will share a conservative legal outlook.

Chief Justice John Roberts may have famously tried to distance the judiciary from Trump's attacks when he reprimanded the then-President in 2018 by saying that "we do not have Obama judges or Trump judges."

But the reality is there are Obama, Trump and Biden nominees.

And now, with a new cascade of judicial retirements and an expected avalanche of new executive orders, the judges will make a difference.

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Biden and Democrats prepare to act fast on judges, having learned lesson from Trump - CNN

POLITICOs James Arkin breaks down why the 2022 Ohio Senate race will be a bellwether of Rust Belt politics in the post-Trump era.

But they see the outcome of the trial, which begins on Tuesday, as a reflection of Trumps viability and influence in the GOP moving forward. And they believe a conviction, which would require the support of at least 17 Republican senators, would simply embolden Trump and enrage his base in a way that hurts the party in 2022 and 2024.

He does a pretty good job of being a victim, a GOP senator, who requested anonymity to candidly address the internal party dynamic, said of Trump. If he were to be convicted, there would be an uproar among his supporters. And it would probably energize them.

Ahead of the trial, Republicans are predicting that no more than a handful of GOP senators will join Democrats in voting to convict Trump, especially after 45 out of the 50 Republicans in the chamber voted last month to declare that the Senate has no jurisdiction over a former president.

Trumps allies are already dreading the trial, though, fearful that a public discussion of the events of Jan. 6 in which a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol after the then-president rallied with them at the White House could damage Trump long-term. GOP senators acknowledged those risks for Trump, even as the trial is shaping up to be a referendum on his standing in the party.

Its going to be aired as publicly as it can be, and its based upon recent events, Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind.) said. So I think how he comes out of it, how he rebuilds, Im not sure where that goes. Thats going to be up to him.

To Democrats, an elevated retelling of the events of Jan. 6 is the next-best option to further ostracize Trump given that a conviction is highly unlikely. While Senate leaders are still haggling over the trials parameters, the House impeachment managers will likely be permitted to use videos and other visuals to make their case a serious advantage for Democrats given that much of their case relies on Trumps public statements and other available footage from the riots at the Capitol.

One of the most powerful reasons for a trial here is the public airing of Donald Trumps really heinous criminal wrongdoing and his criminal intent, said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), a former prosecutor and state attorney general. A trial airs a tableau of evidence and proof that can change the way people think about the individual who is on trial. Even when someone is acquitted, they may still be haunted by the facts that come to light at a trial.

Republicans have already signaled their uneasiness with Trumps lawyers, who in an initial filing last week advanced the former presidents unsubstantiated claims that the election was stolen from him. There is widespread concern among Republicans that the arguments on the Senate floor will turn into a re-litigation of Trumps false allegations of election fraud a discussion that GOP senators arent interested in having, as most of them try to move past Trump.

I think this trial will tell us about what the GOP wants to be going forward, added Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.). Donald Trump did not just drop out of the sky. Everything that he represents has its roots in earlier iterations of the Republican Party.

With expectations already set, Democrats are already telegraphing a shortened trial that punts on the question of whether to subpoena witnesses, with many in the party worried that this weeks exercise will distract from President Joe Bidens legislative and governing agenda, especially if its elongated by new witness testimony.

Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), perhaps Bidens closest confidant in the Senate, said that during his hour-long meeting with the president last week, We did not talk about impeachment. Biden, Coons said, is relentlessly focused on delivering coronavirus relief to Americans, as well as countering China and Russia.

Coons was one of a few Democratic senators who balked at the idea of the House impeachment managers seeking to call Trump in as a witness for the trial, calling it a terrible idea. The Delaware Democrat, like many others in the party, is eager to get the trial in the Senates rear-view mirror.

Republicans, too, want to get through the trial as quickly and painlessly as possible. Apart from arguing that the proceedings are unconstitutional, they have not mounted a substantive defense of Trumps actions. Many of them have already publicly said they believe Trumps rhetoric was reckless and irresponsible.

Focusing on a procedural defense, though, allows Republicans to defend the most popular figure in their party without having to justify the alleged conduct at the heart of the Houses impeachment case.

I think most of the focus is going to be on the constitutionality and the precedent set by trying a former officeholder, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said.

Other Republican senators have tried to appeal directly to Bidens desire to work on legislation that has a tangible impact on Americans reeling from the pandemic and sluggish economy rather than pursuing what they view as an attempt at partisan retribution against a former president whose influence can target those who vote to convict him.

The whole thing is stupid, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said. I know this: Nothing we do next week on that floor is going to help people get vaccines or more people keep their jobs. We should be focused on that instead.

Of course, not all Republicans want Trump to fade into the background. Several GOP senators have directly benefited politically from Trumps backing, and see little or no downside if Trumps wing of the party prevails in the coming years.

In fact, some of their political fortunes are dependent on Trumps continued involvement in the party, especially given his outsized impact on turnout among the GOP base. And many of those same Republicans worry that some of Trumps voters might not turn out when he isnt on the ballot.

I think this idea that congressional Republicans secretly hate Trump is a partial fiction, said Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). I think a lot of them have done very well by him and his movement, and are not looking forward to him disappearing.

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Where Democrats and Republicans agree on Trump - POLITICO