More than any Republican in Congress, Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska can be counted on for candor about the state of her party in the era of Donald Trump. In fact, late last year, about a month after the president won a second term, the senator conceded that she felt “more comfortable” with no party label than with “an identity as a Republican.”

The comments came a few years after Murkowski also saidin the wake of the Jan. 6 attack, “If the Republican Party has become nothing more than the party of Trump, I sincerely question whether this is the party for me.”

This week, the Alaskan raised eyebrows again with comments she hasn’t made publicly before. The Anchorage Daily News reported:

A video of the clip reinforced the impression that the senator chose her words with care.

At the same event, Murkowski described some of the Trump administration’s recent moves as “unlawful” and “against the law.” She similarly expressed concern about the degree to which USAID had “just been obliterated,” described proposed GOP cuts to Medicaid as “devastating” and efforts to politicize the federal judiciary have brought the country to “a very dangerous place.”

Just as notably, the four-term Republican lawmaker acknowledged that Congress has allowed the executive branch to claim too much power. “It’s called the checks and balances. And right, now we are not balancing as the Congress,” Murkowski said.

In recent days, as coverage of the senator’s comments circulated, the broader conversation about her perspective has generally fallen into two camps. One was sympathetic: Many observers have noted that it’s exceedingly rare for any congressional Republican to make comments like these, out loud and in public, and that Murkowski is to be applauded for acknowledging the fears of retaliation that members feel.

The alternative reaction to her comments has been far less charitable: Murkowski is in a position of influence, and she could be using her power far more effectively to push back against the White House, its abuses, its corruption and its authoritarian tactics. There’s nothing wrong with applauding her comments, the argument goes, but it’s just as important to press the Alaskan on her support for Trump-backed bills and some of the White House’s highly unqualified nominees.

Indeed, let’s not forget that when the Republican Party’s far-right budget plan came to the Senate floor a couple of weeks ago, two GOP senator joined Democrats in voting against it — and Murkowski wasn’t one of the two.

Which reaction is the right one? I don’t want this to sound like a cop-out, but I think both are right. I’m glad Murkowski occasionally speaks out like this, and if it inspires some of her GOP colleagues to do the same, it could make a difference. I also believe that if Murkowski recognizes the seriousness of our current circumstances, it’s incumbent on her to do more than just offer candid comments to her constituents.

As the senator no doubt knows, she has other options — legislatively, procedurally, tactically, etc. — and if she really wants to shake things up, Murkowski can announce that she’s ending her formal affiliation with the GOP altogether, even if she continues to caucus with the party.

It’s genuinely awful that she’s afraid and feeling “very anxious,” and I couldn’t agree more that the circumstances that have led to these fears are “not right.” But it’s within the Alaskan’s power to help force a change, and I’ll continue to hope that she takes advantage of these opportunities.

Steve legs

Steve Benen is a producer for “The Rachel Maddow Show,” the editor of MaddowBlog and an BLN political contributor. He’s also the bestselling author of “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past.”

Election conspiracy theorist Mike Lindell has been in the news quite a bit lately. A few weeks ago, for example, the MyPillow founder expressed an interest in launching a Republican gubernatorial campaign in Minnesota.

A couple of weeks later, someone described as a “correspondent” for Lindell’s media operation appeared at a White House press briefing and asked a cringeworthy and overly sycophantic question about Donald Trump, sparking widespread ridicule. This week, the conspiracy theorist was back in the news, telling a judge he’s struggling to pay court-imposed sanctions because his finances are “in ruins” and “nobody will lend me any money anymore.”

But things aren’t all bad for Lindell. As The Washington Post reportedhe apparently still has friends in high places.

According to the report, which has not been independently verified by BLN or NBC News, David Eisner, a Trump appointee at the Treasury Department, contacted senior IRS staff last month about an audit Lindell was facing. Soon after, the same official reportedly contacted the tax agency again, this time about a Republican state senator in Kansas named Rick Kloos.

Eisner reportedly used the phrase “high profile friend of the president” to describe Eisner and Kloos, and wrote that each was “concerned that he may have been inappropriately targeted.”

A related report in The New York Times noted that the IRS did not act on Eisner’s outreach, but the efforts “alarmed agency staff that President Trump hoped to use the tax collector to protect his friends and allies from normal scrutiny, concerns that have only grown as the Trump administration clears out agency leadership and pushes it to carry out Mr. Trump’s directions.”

And therein lies the point: If the IRS is going to survive and maintain its integrity, it must maintain its independence. The agency cannot be a political weapon — though, in the Harvard casethere’s reason to believe Trump sees it as a partisan tool — and just as notably, it can’t offer special treatment to the president’s pals and those politically aligned with the White House.

Nina Olson, who served as the national taxpayer advocate across multiple Democratic and Republican administrations, told the Post of the allegations, “That’s so inappropriate. In my 18 years as the national taxpayer advocate with over 4 million cases that came into the Taxpayer Advocate Service, in that time with taxpayers experiencing significant problems with the IRS, I have never had a Treasury official write me about a case.”

A spokesperson for Trump’s Treasury Department made no effort to deny the claims, instead telling the Times that Eisner “acted appropriately” and simply shared “relevant information” with the IRS. (Eisner did not respond to requests for comment, the Post reported, and a representative from the IRS declined to comment.)

Kloos’ attorney, meanwhile, told the Post that the Kansas legislator is “certainly not a close friend of the president”; he doesn’t know why Eisner contacted the IRS on his behalf; and he’s been engaged in a yearslong court fight over his organization’s tax-exempt status.

As for Lindell, he suggested that this is all just a misunderstanding and that the Treasury Department had “misconstrued” his request, which he said actually stemmed from a problem he was having with the Employee Retention Credit.

I don’t imagine we’ve heard the last of this one.

Steve legs

Steve Benen is a producer for “The Rachel Maddow Show,” the editor of MaddowBlog and an BLN political contributor. He’s also the bestselling author of “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past.”