When will Republicans learn that Democrats and their establishment media allies will never actually like them?
In an interview with veteran propagandist Jake Tapper, which appeared Thursday morning on CNN’s “News Central,” Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina — a notorious Republican in Name Only (RINO) and a recent thorn in the side of President Donald Trump — tried posing as a tough and principled legislator willing to stand up to the president.
The fact that he did it on CNN spoke volumes.
After all, establishment journalists and their audiences tend to view everything through the lens of their toxic obsessions with Trump.
Moreover, despite his recent attempt to rewrite history, few people have carried more water for the anti-Trump establishment than Tapper.
Thus, by running to CNN, Tillis exposed himself as merely the latest weak Republican to genuflect at the altar of liberals’ hatred for Trump.
“I told the president that he’s clearly got the votes,” Tillis began, referring to Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill.”
In the Senate, Tillis voted against the president’s signature legislation. Trump then threatened to primary the senator in 2026. But Tillis responded by announcing that he would not seek re-election.
The president signed the “Big Beautiful Bill” into law on Friday.
Do you think the Senate will be better off without Thom Tillis?
Tillis then insisted that he had promised Trump to tone down his opposition and work with the House.
“And then I got that text,” the senator told Tapper, “that I texted him, or, I never read it, but I saw, like, the first sentence. I told the president in another text, I said ‘Now it’s time to start looking for my replacement, because I don’t deal with that kind of bulls***.”
Readers may view Tillis’ comments in the YouTube video below. The relevant segment began at the 1:05 mark.
Tillis’ lack of clarity in recounting that story made it difficult to discern his precise meaning.
The bottom line, however, is that he described a text exchange with Trump in which the senator, acting purely on principle, stood up to the president and made an honor-driven decision to surrender his Senate seat rather than seek re-election.
In truth, of course, a milquetoast placeholder like Tillis stood no chance against a Trump-backed primary challenger. So the senator took his toys and went home.
No matter how Tillis framed it, his withdrawal from the 2026 Senate race amounts to a major Trump victory.
After all, Tillis has so totally aligned himself with the notorious Washington, D.C. “Swamp” that he parrots establishment talking points about the Capitol incursion of Jan. 6, 2021.
In fact, when he leaves office after the 2026 midterm elections, Tillis no doubt will find a soft landing. Establishment media outlets will seek out his opinion and maybe even employ him as an analyst. Democrats will treat him the way they now treat former Vice President Dick Cheney and his daughter, former Republican Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, whose hatred of Trump constitutes their sole and defining virtue in liberals’ eyes.
Through it all, however, Tillis will remain what he is today: a RINO loser forced to seek comfort from liberals who secretly dislike him, and the latest in a long line of establishment tools whom Trump has vanquished.
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