GOP wising up to the obvious: Biden is the president-elect

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Psst. Don’t tell anyone, but I’ve got a secret I want to share.

Congressional Republicans are finally — finally! — wising up to what we’ve known since, oh, Nov. 3 … which is that Joe Biden beat Donald Trump in the race for president.

The GOP caucus is beginning to sound off, albeit a bit mutedly, that Trump needs to back off his reprehensible attempt to overturn the election results.

President-elect Biden has been proceeding as best he can toward forming a government that will take over on Jan. 20. He has gotten zero help from Trump’s team. Still, the Biden team — led by newly named chief of staff Ronald Klain — is lining up Cabinet and senior staff appointees, some of whom the POTUS-elect plans to announce on Tuesday.

Now comes word that some Republican senators and House members are telling their staffs to start working with the president-elect’s team.

Newsweek, for instance, reports: Sen. Kevin Kramer, a North Dakota Republican, said that he has instructed his staff to cooperate with any outreach from President-elect Biden’s transition team while asserting that it was “past time” for President Donald Trump to do the same.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a longtime Trump supporter, said this morning that Trump’s refusal to help Biden’s effort to form a government is “undemocratic” and is a “national embarrassment.” Sen. Pat Toomey, a Pennsylvania Republican and another senatorial Trumpkin, has said the same thing.  Same for Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, the GOP presidential nominee in 2012.

It might be said that it’s a bit “too little and too late” for the GOP to start coming around. I won’t go there. I welcome the Republican pressure. Will it persuade Donald Trump to give up his fight to undermine our democratic process? Will it stem the embarrassment he is bringing to us from around the world? Will it cause Trump to stop endangering the safety and well-being of Americans?

Time will have to reveal all of that. For the time being, I am going to cling to a glimmer of hope that the GOP uprising will pay off.