Mr. Trump’s polarized political standing and effort to return to the White House have plunged the party into a deeply unpredictable landscape, a situation unlike any since 1912, when Theodore Roosevelt’s attempt to recapture the presidency split the Republican Party four years after he left office.
Mr. Trump enters the race as the party’s front-runner and owns by far the most robust fund-raising apparatus. Yet many R.N.C. members said he had nonetheless taken on the image of a loser after his 2020 defeat to President Biden, who is expected to announce his own re-election bid in the coming months. Mr. Trump’s subsequent refusal to accept the results and his endorsements of G.O.P. candidates in 2022 who stressed their devotion to him — and then lost seats in key battleground states including Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — have some saying they are ready for a divorce.
“To win 50 percent plus one in the Electoral College requires us to find an alternative and I think we’ve got plenty of good choices,” said John Hammond, an R.N.C. member from Indiana. “We can’t be a cult of personality any longer.”
Speaking to one another, members of the committee can be even more blunt. The R.N.C.’s rules dictate that it is neutral in primaries, but members are free to back whomever they like.
“I supported Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020, but it is clearly time for the Republican Party to move on from Donald Trump,” Oscar Brock, an R.N.C. member from Tennessee, wrote last week in a mass email to other members that was first reported by The Washington Post. “I know many of you feel the same way I do.”
Mr. Trump still maintains a loyal following. Already, he has picked up endorsements in South Carolina from Gov. Henry McMaster and Senator Lindsey Graham and will be delivering a keynote address Saturday to the New Hampshire Republican Party, whose chairman, Stephen Stepanek, remains a key supporter. The most recent polling shows Mr. Trump leading Mr. DeSantis in the primary, a shift from late last year when Mr. DeSantis had a small lead.
Those seeking a new nominee say they object to Mr. Trump’s temperament and his focus on the 2020 election. By and large, they remain supportive of the stances on foreign policy, immigration, trade and cultural issues that powered his campaign and transformed the party’s ideology.
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