Kansas’ Jerry Moran still won’t endorse Trump as president. How long can he hold out? | Opinion

It’s the job of every good Republican to work for Donald’s Trump election, right?

Right?

That’s certainly what Sen. Eric Schmitt of Missouri is doing. “Kamala Harris is a San Francisco radical,” he declared in a social media post over the weekend.

Same goes for Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas. “In the last 50 days, Kamala Harris has done ZERO press conferences,” he posted Monday. “Where is the transparency? Where is the accountability?

Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri is busy with his own race against Democrat Lucas Kunce, but he’s also pitching in. Harris, he said last week, has “spent her entire time in office selling out American workers.”

What about Sen. Jerry Moran of Kansas?

Well, his social media feed looks a little different. There are no defenses of Trump or attacks on Harris. Instead, there are posts featuring his visit to the Kansas State Fair, a speech to Beloit’s Rotary Club, and pictures of his appearance in Hoisington’s Labor Day parade.

It’s not incendiary. But it is — how to put this kindly? — kind of boring.

And that’s entirely by design. Americans may be consumed by the presidential election. Moran is sitting it out.

To be fair, he appears to sit out every presidential election. “I don’t endorse candidates,” he told Axios in July. “Never have.”

A spokesman for Moran told me on Friday that is still the senator’s position. He also pointed out that Moran is raising money for GOP candidates in U.S. Senate races across the country, as well as for Kansas Republicans in state legislative races.

So Moran is doing his bit for Republicans. He’s just not doing it for the biggest name in the Republican Party.

That’s extraordinary. Trump is not the sort of figure who invites neutrality, official or otherwise. You’re either for him or against him.

Republicans who aren’t for him? They generally don’t get to stay in office very long.

Mitt Romney — who was the GOP nominee in 2012 — is retiring from the Senate after this year, weary of being ostracized by his own party for vocal opposition to Trump’s assaults on the Constitution. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is similarly bowing out of leadership, recognizing he’s insufficiently aligned with the MAGA Republicans.

Dick and Liz Cheney used to sit at the pinnacle of the Republican Party. They, too, have been cast into the outer reaches of RINO-dom. They’re both endorsing Harris this year.

Moran has walked a finer line. He has never embraced Trump’s combative style, and he rejected the Big Lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen by Democrats.

But he also voted against the Trump impeachment after Jan. 6. And — just a few weeks after the insurrection — Moran accepted Trump’s endorsement for his own reelection bid in 2022.

You do what you have to do to stay in office, I guess.

Here’s my embarrassing admission: I like Jerry Moran. I don’t share his conservative politics, but I appreciate that he hasn’t joined the crowd in practicing the contempt-and-grievance method of Trumpist politics so prevalent in the GOP today. He’s normal. I suspect we’ll miss him when he’s gone.

I just wonder how long Moran’s balancing act can last.

There is danger looming in the next few months if Trump wins: On Saturday, the former president promised supporters that his planned mass deportations of undocumented migrants will make for a “bloody story.” There’s also danger coming if he loses: Trump has never accepted the results of an election he lost. There is zero reason to think he ever will.

We all know what happened last time.

Donald Trump always forces the issue sooner or later: You are either for him or against him. Moran is one of the few people in American life who has chosen to duck the question this campaign season. Come November, though, there may not be any wiggle room left.

Joel Mathis is a regular Kansas City Star and Wichita Eagle Opinion correspondent. Formerly a writer and editor at Kansas newspapers, he served nine years as a syndicated columnist.