GOP worries fiscal conservatism losing its rallying cry

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) said “unfortunately” fiscal concerns are “probably” not as important to the GOP base as 10 years ago and that Trump helped transform the party’s priorities. “It wasn’t something that was an important issue for President Trump, and so many of our base voters align themselves with President Trump. It’s almost like now debt, deficits, spending become abstract issues that a lot of folks aren’t paying attention to and should be,” he said. There was a “political evolution,” Thune said, and the fiscal conservatism that was a core tenet of the Tea Party “got displaced ... by the more populist elements” of the Republican Party. He went on to say that while Trump was able to energize voters by hitting on hot-button cultural topics, such as immigration and border security, it’s now time for the GOP to get back to its traditional stance on fiscal issues.