What Is John Thune For?

The Economist: “Nearly a decade ago, led by Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, Republicans struck a shaky accommodation with Donald Trump, an invasive species. Mr McConnell infused Mr Trump’s MAGA agenda with Reaganism: cutting taxes, making federal courts more conservative and boosting military spending. But Mr Trump proved impossible to contain and had little regard for the institutions Mr McConnell and his allies revered. By the end of the president’s first term, their pact had all but broken down. The two men no longer speak. Now, Mr Trump is back on top of a Republican Party fashioned even more emphatically in his own image.”

“It has fallen to John Thune, Mr McConnell’s successor and ideological ally, to hold the traditionalist line. Elected Senate majority leader last November against the wishes of the MAGA base, the four-term senator from South Dakota is an awkward fit in the president’s transformed party. He represents continuity with Mr McConnell’s brand of conservatism, under whom he climbed the ranks of leadership. He has largely used the same playbook: making Mr Trump’s legislative agenda more appealing to Reagan conservatives, while staying mum over the president’s more extreme policies, even those that undermine Congress.”

“His balancing act is working, at least for now. But will Mr Thune, a longtime defender of the Senate’s prerogatives, ever stand up to the president as Mr McConnell occasionally did?”