What does end of Trump presidency mean for Republican party moving forward?

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- Marquette Law Poll director Charles Franklin says it makes more political sense for congressmen like Scott Fitzgerald and Tom Tiffany to object to election results because they are in solidly Republican, and generally pro-Trump districts.

"So many of their constituents are positive towards Trump, and frankly, they don’t have an electoral threat from the Democrats, they have an electoral threat from Trump supporters in the primary.”

Franklin says all year through the election, the 30 percent of voters who identify firmly as Republicans continued to have a favorability of the president in the high 80s.

“It’s very clear that the president developed a strong following in the Republican party here in the state," Franklin said.

But all that came before the legal challenges and the riot at the Capitol.

Republican favorability has dipped in the initial polls following those events. UWM professor Mordecai Lee said he expects the party to split into two wings.

“There’s going to be the Trump wing, which I think is getting smaller and smaller, and there’s going to be sort of the mainstream, conservative wing. The sort of Scott Walkers of the world."

Lee said you could see those wings come to a head in primaries, especially in districts like Fitzgerald's, with both rural areas, and suburban areas like Waukesha.

“Is he going to have TV ads where he proudly says that he stood with Trump to overturn the election even after the riot?" Lee asked. "In other words, is this a badge of courage, or does it become something he wishes the voters would forget.”

Franklin said they do plan to ask Wisconsinites what they think of the Capitol riot in the next MU Law Poll, but they turn out less polls the year after a presidential election.