From the start of Trump's run for president until the middle of 2018

[NewJeffCT]

it seems like Republicans would often speak out about Trump's words and/or tweets - usually to express concern or to say that it was inappropriate or not proper.

However, it seems like some time after the middle of 2018, the Republicans stopped doing even that - hardly a peep from them, not even hand wringing or expressions of concern anymore. It was lock step unity behind Trump from every GOPer in Congress. GOPers would run away from the media and not answer questions about Trump.

What happened in the middle of 2018? Well, 7 Republican Senators and a Republican member of Congress made a July 4, 2018 pilgrimage to Moscow to meet with Putin.

Since then, the criticism of Trump has dried up - at least until impeachment hearings started where the GOP was back to saying it's bad, but not impeachable.

What happened at this meeting? Did Putin promise them help in 2020? Did he reveal what Kompromat he had over each of them and others in the GOP? Both? Something else? Am I way off base here in thinking something sinister happened there?

as a reminder, these people were:
Senators:
Richard Shelby of Alabama (fixed - thanks UpInArms)
Steve Daines of Montana
John Thune of South Dakota
John "Too Stupid" Kennedy of Louisiana,
Jerry Moran of Kansas
John Hoeven of North Dakota

and Rep. Kay Granger of Texas.

[UpInArms]

1. Not disagreeing with your post,

Just want to point out that Shelby is from Alabama, not Arkansas

...

I think Putin has dirt on all of them ...

[NewJeffCT]

2. thanks for the correction

I fixed it and credited it to you

[UpInArms]

3. No credit needed

Thanks for the OP ...

Good information can only help all of us

[smirkymonkey]

4. K&R

[SKKY]

5. That Putin, or more likely Trump, has dirt on all of these folks is the only thing...

...that makes sense. What is the benefit to people like Jordan, Nunes, Graham, etc that justifies their acquiescence?

[Mike 03]

6. Interesting. You know who else went to Moscow a month later?

Date: August 9, 2018 8:37 AM ET
NPR: Rand Paul Goes To Russia And Delivers Letter For Trump, Marking Our Era Of Irony

Many have also seen the visuals of Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul hobnobbing in Moscow this week with members of the Russian Council, sometimes called his "counterparts." These included the chairman of the council's foreign policy panel, Konstantin Kosachev, who happens to be under official U.S. sanction for his government's actions against our government.

But that didn't seem to bother Paul, who invited Kosachev and others to visit the USA.

Indeed, this sanction and other tokens of disapproval imposed on Russian officials in the past year have not seemed to chill the enduring warmth between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Trump. Paul carried a handwritten note from Trump to Putin on his trip.

A recent Gallup Poll showed some 40 percent of Republicans, a plurality of the self-identified category, now regard Russia as an ally or at least as a country friendly to the United States. That is double the percentage of Republicans who expressed that view to Gallup in 2014.

link: https://www.npr.org/2018/08/09/636982295/is-it-springtime-for-putin-and-republicans

[captain queeg]

7. John McCain died in August 2018

Not a fan of his but he occasionally took the orange one to task.

[dewsgirl]

8. I believe Ron Johnson was one of the Moscow 8.

[Mike 03]

9. You're right. Good catch.

From July 9, 2018

Roll Call: After Moscow Trip, Ron Johnson Says Election Meddling Overblown

One of the Republican senators back from a trip to Moscow is suggesting that Congress went too far in punishing Russia for meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

“I’ve been pretty upfront that the election interference — as serious as that was, and unacceptable — is not the greatest threat to our democracy,” Sen. Ron Johnson said in an interview with the Washington Examiner published over the weekend. “We’ve blown it way out of proportion.”

“We need to really honestly assess what actually happened, what effect did it have, and what effect are our sanctions actually having, positively and negatively,” the Republican from Wisconsin said.

SNIP Get a load of this:

Other Republican senators on the trip returned to the United States with a much more strident tone, including Louisiana’s John Kennedy.

Kennedy said in a CNN interview Monday that the message for Russia was, “stop screwing with American elections.”

https://www.rollcall.com/news/politics/republican-senator-returns-moscow-says-election-meddling-overblown

[dewsgirl]

10. I checked when Chuck Todd of all people had to shut him down.

[PRETZEL]

11. Seems to me that Sen. Johnson has become an interesting figure

he has the appearance of playing both sides of the this game,

On the one hand, he's going around with Sen. Murphy doing the "official" things, while at the same time, his name has been bantied around in the "un-official" tracks that Guilliani seems to be going through,

Maybe it's me, but I just get a weird feeling he's more involved than many of us here may know.

[Mike 03]

13. Agreed.

As Dewsgirl mentioned, that interview with Chuck Todd was off-the-charts weird. It was a Lady MacBeth moment. He does seem like he knows more than he claims.

[Botany]

12. And don't forget how Lindsey Graham flipped to become pro-Trump after a Oct. 2017 Golf outing w/

... Trump. https://www.golf.com/tour-news/2017/10/09/president-trump-shot-73-windy-and-wet-conditions-says-sen-lindsey-graham

BTW Graham said that Trump shot a 1 over 73 in wet and windy conditions.