Ross Douthat: “The weakness Trump showed this week is real, but it isn’t new. His power over the GOP has always been limited: As president he often found himself balked on policy by congressional Republicans, and his impressive endorsement record reflects a lot of cautious winner-picking, not aggressive movement-building.”

“Limits on his power, however, are not the same things as limits on his support. The rule in the Trump era is that you can oppose Trump indirectly or win without his endorsement — but save for a few unusual cases, you can’t challenge him personally and expect to have Republican voters on your side. In areas that involve the details of policy or the machinery of governance, Trump can be defeated. In any referendum on the question ‘Should Donald Trump be our leader in the battle against liberalism?’ his winning record is unmatched.”

Susan Glasser: “Still, it has long struck me that the Trump Presidency was very much a House-style Presidency, just as Biden’s politics have undoubtedly been shaped by his thirty-six years in the Senate. Performative politics, edgy partisanship, and lots of shouting have long been in the House’s DNA. Remember the Benghazi hearings?”

“For much of his time in office, Trump was literally surrounded by veterans of the most extreme House Republican faction: the Freedom Caucus. That group produced two of Trump’s four White House chiefs of staff: Mark Meadows and Mick Mulvaney. John Boehner, the former Republican Speaker of the House who quit under pressure from the Freedom Caucus, called them ‘political terrorists’ in his recent memoir.”

CNN: “The night and day contrast between the current and former conference chairs — who were both dubbed rising GOP stars early on in their congressional careers — perfectly encapsulates the bitter rift in today’s Republican party, where lawmakers are still duking it out over the direction of the post-Trump GOP.”

As Stefanik told Fox News’ Sean Hannity this week: “Cheney is a Pelosi Republican, a Pelosi pawn at this point. She does not represent the Republican Conference, or Republican voters, or the American people.”

When presented with Stefanik’s comments from the press conference earlier this week, Cheney told CNN’s Jake Tapper: “If I were saying the things that you just played, I’d be deeply ashamed of myself.”

Alexandra Petri: “​​The point is not that the Unified Trump GOP Canon for What Truly Happened on Jan. 6 is being continually and contradictorily rewritten. The point is not that what we are being told is absurd, inconsistent and downright goofy.”

“The point is that the specifics don’t matter; what matters is that we are being told, blatantly, repeatedly and without shame, that we simply did not see what we saw, and we are expected to go along with it. This is an exercise in power, to see how malleable our reality really is.”

New York Times: “Mr. Biden’s name has been as absent from the G.O.P. pleas for cash as Mr. Trump has been pervasive, a warning sign that Republicans are struggling to stir the kind of impassioned opposition to him that they had once generated to former President Barack Obama.”

“Since May 1, the Republicans’ Senate campaign arm has invoked Mr. Biden’s name in the sender line on its emails just four times; Mr. Trump’s name has appeared there 185 times.”

A new Fabrizio, Lee & Associates poll pegs the net approval rating among GOP voters of several key Republicans:

• Donald Trump Jr.: +55
• Gov. Ron DeSantis: +54
• House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy: +24
• Rep. Matt Gaetz: +17
• Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene: +8
• Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell: +2
• Rep. Liz Cheney: -43

Samuel Goldman: “Like California, Florida’s population has been heavily affected by Hispanic immigration. That immigration has different sources, though. Hispanics in California are predominantly of Mexican descent.”

“The situation is different in Florida. Cuban-Americans are a longstanding bloc of Republican voters. But Venezuelans and other Latinos who have fled socialist regimes and may be attracted to conservative messages. Donald Trump’s strong showing with these voters (as well as with Tejanos) suggests that Republicans don’t have an insurmountable problem with Hispanic voters or immigrants as such.”

“At minimum, though, Republicans’ prospects in Florida should relieve the pessimism that characterizes some conservatives’ attitudes toward immigration and cultural pluralism. Florida not only shows that Republicans can win non-white voters, but that they can do so without merely echoing Democrats’ positions.”

Former New Jersey Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, who was elected twice on a ticket with Gov. Chris Christie (R), has left the Republican Party and is now an unaffiliated voter, the New Jersey Globe reports.