Finally, when I asked what role the former president would play, Gingrich said, "Trump remains the most powerful voice in the GOP, and if we find common ground to offer a positive, better future, he can be enormously helpful carrying those ideas to the American people." What Gingrich is doing is trying to enlist Trump in organizing and selling a platform for Republicans to run on after Trump. The two key points in Gingrich's approach are, one, focusing on issues that pull Republicans together rather than "personalities that drive us apart," and two, looking forward and being positive rather than lapsing into "defensive negativity, looking backwards." Gingrich knows Republicans are working in a hugely negative media environment. Just google "Republican civil war" and you'll see the extent to which some news organizations dwell on real and imagined differences inside the GOP. Some of those same news organizations devote an inordinate amount of their coverage to Trump, even though he is a former president and a new president is trying to enact a far-reaching agenda that could bring enormous changes to life in the United States. For some, politics is still Trump, Trump, Trump. The Gingrich proposal is a plan for Republicans to focus on issues rather than be swept along in a media environment created by hostile journalists.