Keller: One guardrail keeping Donald Trump's transition in check - senators up for re-election
The opinions expressed below are Jon Keller's, not those of WBZ, CBS News or Paramount Global.
BOSTON - For many of President-elect Donald Trump's critics, the election result raised a chilling question - what restraints would there be on his use of presidential power?
"Just imagine Donald Trump with no guardrails," said Kamala Harris to a chorus of boos in her Democratic National Convention acceptance speech.
That was a key scare tactic of the Democratic campaign, but it seemed voters were more scared of their weekly grocery bill.
Republicans in Congress oppose picks
Yet as the Trump transition rolls on, it seems there may be some guardrails after all.
Republicans in Congress refused to swallow Trump's choice of Matt Gaetz for Attorney General. And in the comments of key conservative senators on embattled Defense Secretary nominee Pete Hegseth, an interesting pattern is emerging following an outpouring of Gaetz-esque dirt.
Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyoming): "He does need to address those because this was not something of which we were aware, nor was President Trump aware."
Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-South Carolina): "Some of these articles are very disturbing. He obviously has a chance to defend himself here but some of this stuff is gonna be difficult."
Sen, Tommy Tuberville (R-Alabama): "Obviously if it's to a certain degree people are not gonna vote to confirm him."
Lummus, Graham, Tuberville - all up for re-election just two years from now.
Potential political guardrails
"A little bit of evidence that not every senator in the Republican majority is going to do whatever Trump tells him to," says Bill Scher, politics editor of the Washington Monthly magazine. "The president-elect himself can't run again and so if he becomes obviously unpopular, a proper calculation for a senator might say it's time to put some distance between myself and him."
All this is hardly evidence of any widespread revolt against Trump by congressional Republicans, and Trump still has a ways to go to match Barack Obama's modern-day record of three cabinet nominees who withdrew before their nominations came up for a vote.
But when Harris talked about "no guardrails," she meant the presidential immunity from criminal prosecution and Trump's disregard for ethical customs. Yet, he still has the courts to contend with, and we're seeing with these nominees that there are potential political guardrails that could curb some of what he wants to do.
