Republican Discomfort With Trump

Concern for Trump's character and presidency including his lying, crude behavior, illegal actions and fiscally irresponsible policies have caused some republicans to leave the GOP.

Iowa’s longest-serving Republican legislator, state Rep. Andy McKean, ditched the GOP on Tuesday as he offered a searing renunciation of President Trump, saying he could no longer support Trump as the party’s standard-bearer due to his “unacceptable behavior” and “reckless spending.”

McKean revealed he would join the Democratic Party, a decision he described as a “very difficult” after spending nearly a half-century as a registered Republican and 26 years in the Legislature.

“Unacceptable behavior should be called out for what it is,” he said during the news conference at the Iowa Statehouse in Des Moines, “and Americans of all parties should insist on something far better in the leader of their country and the free world.”

McKean now joins the ranks of state Republican officials who have fled the party amid a divisive presidency and shifting political landscape. From Kansas to New Jersey, a slow succession of state lawmakers and officials, largely in suburban districts that have become less red, have both startled and appeased constituents by crossing the aisle, oftentimes citing Trump’s rhetoric, policies and a disagreement with their party’s responses to his behavior.

“He sets, in my opinion, a poor example for the nation and particularly for our children by personally insulting, often in a crude and juvenile fashion, those who disagree with him, being a bully at a time when we’re attempting to discourage bullying,” McKean said. [washingtonpost.com]