Opinion: How anti-MAGA Republicans can regain their power

In a presidential election likely to be decided by razor-thin margins, a key question remains: What will anti-Trump Republicans do on Election Day?
A number of prominent Republicans, such as former Vice President Dick Cheney, former Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, and former Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, have publicly endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris. So have George Will, David French and other conservative intellectuals, as well as more than 200 Bush, McCain and Romney alumni and more than 100 former GOP national security officials. Former President George W. Bush’s attorney general Alberto Gonzales spoke for many in this crowd when he explained his vote for Harris as arising from “the necessity of electing a president who respects the rule of law to safeguard our liberties and way of life.”
Other high-profile Republicans like former Vice President Mike Pence, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, and former Sen. Pat Toomey and former Speaker Paul Ryan have ruled out voting for former President Donald Trump, but are withholding support for the Democratic ticket. This has been Sen. Mitt Romney’s approach recently. Sen. Susan Collins has promised to write in Nikki Haley. Others might stay home or leave the presidential line blank. For this camp, Trump’s unfitness is irrefutable, but pulling the lever for a party they’ve long opposed is a bridge too far.
What if there were another option? What if a lifelong Republican could use their ballot to clearly affirm their commitment to conservative principles and actually help defeat the candidate they fear taking power? It’s gone largely unnoticed, but Romney himself floated such an idea early in the 2024 cycle. While it’s too late to realize his vision this fall, odds are this isn’t the last center-left vs. MAGA matchup we’ll encounter.
The solution is simple: form a new, conservative, rule-of-law political party, just as Liz Cheney recently proposed. But instead of putting forward a challenger with no chance of winning — as No Labels and others have tried — they would nominate whichever of the two leading candidates better reflects their core values. Meaning they could choose someone like Harris, even if she is also the Democratic nominee.
On the ballot, the candidate would appear as the nominee of both parties. By casting their vote on their new party’s ballot line, anti-MAGA Republicans could help elect the only candidate capable of defeating the populist they want to keep out of the White House, while also signaling their continued commitment to rule-of-law conservatism.
For anti-MAGA Republicans, this new ballot line could be transformative. They would have an opportunity to object to liberal aspects of the Democratic agenda and instead affirm deeply held ideological convictions — without throwing away a vote in protest. If their candidate wins, their share of credit for victory will be plain and spelled out in the vote totals. And if they prove to be a meaningful share of a winning coalition, they’ll be well-positioned to leverage this electoral strength to demand commensurate attention to their top issues and priorities.
This same “fusion” strategy has been used throughout U.S. history by parts of the electorate, like anti-MAGA Republicans today, who do not fit neatly within either major party. This was one way that anti-slavery third parties in the 1840s and 1850s helped elect principled Whigs and Democrats, despite both parties largely acquiescing to our nation’s founding sin. The Republican Party itself was formed by these same anti-slavery visionaries shortly thereafter.
Rule-of-law conservatives are free to explore this path in a number of states already. In others, where state laws prevent a candidate from accepting a second party’s nomination, there is ample time to amend the rules before the next cycle. In fact, many of those restrictions are unlawful and would not survive a court challenge.
The extent to which other principled conservatives follow the lead of Gonzales, Will and the Cheneys could decide the outcome of the 2024 election. Whether they “fuse” with Democratic nominees in the future could decide the extent to which rule-of-law conservatism continues to enjoy a prominent role in U.S. politics for years to come.
Beau Tremitiere, of United to Protect Democracy, leads projects targeting political extremism and authoritarianism, including litigation challenging state laws prohibiting fusion voting. He previously served as an aide to West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin.