Who are President Trump’s Allies in the House of Representatives?

Andrew J. Clarke; Jeffery A. Jenkins

doi:10.1515/for-2017-0029

Article

Who are President Trump’s Allies in the House of Representatives?

Andrew J. Clarke and Jeffery A. Jenkins

Published/Copyright: November 7, 2017

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From the journal The Forum Volume 15 Issue 3

Abstract

We conduct a preliminary analysis of the first 200 days of the Donald Trump presidency, to determine who his principal allies in the US House have been. We build our analysis around three groups of Republicans, based on caucus affiliations: members of the Republican Main Street Partnership (RMSP), the Republican Study Committee (RSC), and the House Freedom Caucus (HFC). We find that House Republicans, regardless off caucus membership, broadly support President Trump and largely shared in the his electoral success. Yet, we also uncover suggestive evidence that the HFC is maneuvering into a position of influence with President Trump. Freedom Caucus members are more closely tied to his electoral performance than members of other conservative groups, and they appear to receive more time with the President relative to a comparable group of House Republicans. While these results are interesting, they are also initial and more time is needed to assess how President Trump builds a winning coalition with Republican House members.

Corresponding authors: Andrew J. Clarke, Assistant Professor, Department of Government and Law, Lafayette College, Easton, PA 18042-1780, USA; and Jeffery A. Jenkins, Provost Professor, Public Policy, Political Science, and Law; the Judith and John Bedrosian Chair of Governance and the Public Enterprise; and Director of the Bedrosian Center at the Sol Price School of Public Policy, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089-0626, USA

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Published Online: 2017-11-7

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https://doi.org/10.1515/for-2017-0029