President Trump put Republican Senate candidates like Alaska’s Dan Sullivan in an awkward spot during the debate Tuesday, when Trump said the Proud Boys should “stand by.”
In the basement of the U.S. Capitol Thursday, CNN’s Ted Barrett caught up with Sullivan.
“Senator, should the president have condemned white supremacy at the debate the other night?” Barrett asked.
“I’m not commenting. I didn’t see the debate,” Sullivan said, words that drew scoffs and worse when they were posted on social media.
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“You didn’t see the debate?” Barrett said.
“I was doing another event, for myself,” Sullivan said.
Barrett tried another question as Sullivan boarded the subway that runs between the Capitol and the Senate office buildings: “Does it hurt your race, him saying things like that?”
Sullivan let the automatic door close on the subway car without answering.
“I have consistently and unambiguously denounced white supremacy and expect all others to do the same,” he said later in a written statement .
In the Senate chamber, Democrats tried a different pressure tactic, with a statement vote on protecting President Obama’s signature health care law.
Sullivan was one of only six Republicans to vote with Democrats to proceed on a bill that would have prevented the government from joining legal challenges to overturn the law, such as one that will be before the Supreme Court next month.
The vote was on a procedural motion, not the bill itself, and it failed. Sullivan spokeswoman Amanda Coyne said the senator believes the issue is worth a broader Senate debate. She didn’t say how he felt about the substance of the bill.
His vote was a surprise, since Sullivan, in 2014, campaigned on overturning the Affordable Care Act and he’s voted to do so in the Senate.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., forced Thursday’s vote, and he quickly made political use of it. He said he expected a few Republicans would decide it wouldn’t look good if they were perceived to be eliminating health care coverage for millions of Americans.
“We knew that some of them would squirm,” Schumer told reporters. “But when you flip your vote a few weeks before the election, the American people see right through it.”
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All six Republicans who voted with the Democrats are in tight races, except for Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who is not on the ballot in November. Her vote was not surprising since she has broken with her party in the past to support the Affordable Care Act.
Liz Ruskin is the Washington, D.C., correspondent at Alaska Public Media. Reach her at lruskin@alaskapublic.org. Read more about Liz here.
