Dick Cheney is a career Republican still vilified by Democrats for his bullish defense of the Iraq War as vice president. But his partisan loyalties were cast aside in extraordinary fashion last week when he endorsed Democrat Kamala Harris for the White House.
Alberto Gonzales' service in George W. Bush's administration was roiled by debates over intrusive government eavesdropping and an abrupt purging of U.S. attorneys that Democrats regarded with intense suspicion. Yet the former attorney general is also opting for Harris over Republican Donald Trump .
The endorsements crystalized the remarkable evolution of the Republican Party's establishment wing, which ruled Washington during the Bush years only to be sidelined once Trump wrested control of the party. These figures, once reviled by Democrats, are so alarmed by the prospect of the former president's return to power that they are prepared to oppose their own party's nominee for the White House.
In the process, they are giving Harris a critical opening to broaden her base of support.
"It's easier for prominent Republicans like Cheney and Gonzales to say, 'I support Kamala Harris' because, in effect, their old home has been ransacked and destroyed," said Will Marshall, the founder of the Progressive Policy Institute, a center-left think tank. "The ties of partisanship, which are always strong in both parties, are attenuated by the fact that Trump has made today's Republican Party absolutely unwelcome for prominent Republicans who served in previous administrations."
