Five Republican senators have canceled plans to attend the party convention in Florida next month
President Donald Trump‘s divisive rhetoric appears to be starting to catch up with him.
With the Republican National Convention approaching next month, support for the incumbent among his own party could be dwindling.
USA Today reports that an increasing number of Republicans are “fed up” with the president and split from him for various reasons, including his stance on wearing a mask during the coronavirus pandemic, his tone addressing race relations in America and his support of keeping up Confederate statues.
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“There’s a real disagreement between the president and his party in this election,” stated Alex Conant, GOP strategist and former aide to Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida. “I think a lot of Republicans are really fed up with the president’s divisive strategy. People are just throwing up their hands with some of the rhetoric that’s coming out of the president. It’s really unhelpful not just to his own re-election, but also to keeping the Senate.”
Several GOP officials have announced they are canceling plans to attend the national convention scheduled in Jacksonville, Florida in late August. The lawmakers and party members are deeming their attendance unsafe because of the state’s recent surge of COVID-19 cases.
Among the Republicans who will be absent are Sens. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, Mitt Romney of Utah, Lamar Alexander of Tennesse, Susan Collins of Mine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, all citing the pandemic.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky, has yet to make his decision on whether or not he’ll be present at the RNC.
READ MORE: Trump to accept GOP nomination in Jacksonville, Florida
“We’ll have to wait and see how things look in late August to determine whether or not we can safely convene with that many people,” he said.
Another GOP strategist, Matt Gorman, expressed that Republicans don’t have much incentive to attend this year’s RNC because of the likelihood of low attendance of media and donors.
“For a lot of these elected officials, it’s a chance to go there for fundraising and press attention,” Gorman said. “And if a lot of media folks are not planning to go and a lot of donors choose not to go because in-person fundraising is a bit less prevalent, then there’s not much incentive to show up.”
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