In near term you are mostly ie 85% right. And yet the time will come when they'll have to choose between themselves and Trump in the 2026 and 2028 elections. Meanwhile, I think a lot of Republicans simply don't know how to handle this and by inertia do nothing out of cowardice.

Now this situation is complicated. Take the border. The dems (plus cnn, ms-now) cannot bring themselves to say: illegal immigrants must be deported, and those adjudicated in court ordered to leave but didn't must be deported. That kind of stupidy doesn't help force Republicans to get a backbone as it may keep the voting public somewhat on trump side, which happened on 2024.

At the same time ICE's execution is so piss-poor including ignoring habius corps, ignoring court orders, snd killing US citizens Republicans without backbone cannot delay their reckoning overly long.

Indeed republican congressman are uniquely positioned to effect law+funding to deport lawfully, to require operational control at the border, and to mark off limits those that are here legally and do something about the multi-year backlog in cases. And importantly hold the executive branch in check.