And... What's The Alternative Anyway?
Republican presidential aspirants who aren’t named Donald Trump are hoping Trump gets knocking out of the running by his legal difficulties, something. That would make the Republican Party primary dynamic something like, who is the most viable nominee who isn’t named Ron DeSantis.
The latest public polling— this week from Morning Consult— shows this:
Trump- 60%
DeSantis- 19%
Pence- 5%
Ramaswarmy- 5%
Haley- 3%
Cheney- 2%
Abbott- 1%
Noem- 1%
Scott- 1%
Hutchinson- 1%
Asked for whom they would vote if Trump was eliminated, Republican primary voters aren’t ready to fall entirely behind an y one candidate, but DeSantis is way ahead. Certainly that would also cause Dan avalanche of other candidates to jump in, from Chris Christie, Greg Abbott, Tom Cotton, Mike Rogers, Chris Sununu, Ted Cruz and Francis Suarez to Tucker Carlson, And Paul and Glenn Youngkin. So… no telling what would happen, beyond a made-for-TV shit show. This doesn’t mean much at all:
“Almost everywhere the mild-mannered Pence goes,” reported Jonathan Allen and Dasha Burns yesterday, “he finds Americans who are moved to deep anger by his very presence. At a National Rifle Association conference last month, Pence was the only featured speaker who was greeted with a cascade of lusty boos. But Pence, who is slowly taking steps toward a 2024 presidential bid, appears to be undeterred by the vitriol— or by primary polls that consistently show him registering in single digits with Republican voters. Instead, he increasingly sounds like a candidate who has decided to enter the race but isn’t ready to make that official. What remains less clear is the path to the presidency for a candidate whose traditional conservative politics, establishment bona fides and regard for democratic institutions have all been out of vogue for Republicans in the Trump era. Many of former President Donald Trump’s hardest-core supporters treat him as a traitor because he rejected Trump’s entreaties to obstruct the electoral-vote count that sealed their fate in the 2020 election.” And to win the primary he has to get most of the 60% of Trump die-hards. He said Trump had never sexually assaulted any women in front of him.
But will Trump get knocked out of the primary? Probably not, at least not just because he was found guilty of being a sexual molester. Republicans don’t care. #NeverTrump establishment Republican strategist Sarah Longwell told Politico that “she conducted a focus group last week in which two-time Trump voters were asked about the Carroll lawsuit. Just one of the seven voters, a woman, had heard of it— ‘and she didn’t believe her,’ Longwell said. Throughout other recent focus groups with Republican voters, Longwell and her staff have remarked internally about how Trump’s support is ‘the fiercest’ among women who have already supported him twice. ‘I wish things were different, but I can’t see this changing anything in a Republican primary,’ Longwell said of the sexual abuse verdict Tuesday. ‘The things that are going to change anything in a Republican primary are if the field— his opponents for 2024— show some political backbone and political talent and ability to capture some of the oxygen that he is sucking up.’”
I have two sisters. One’s a MAGAt-- a two time Trump voter abd delusiuonal believer in the whole mess-- and the other is just a normal person. The normal one asked the MAGAt if she had heard about the conviction. The MAGAt said she had but didn’t believe a word of it. The normal sister asked her if she had seen the Access Hollywood tape. She hadn’t. She asked her if she had seen the video of Trump identifying a picture of E. Jean Carroll, the woman he sexually assaulted but couldn’t quite get it in, as his ex-wife, Marla Maples:
Nope; she only watches Fox; I guess Fox isn’t showing that to their audience. Let me get back to Longwell for a moment. Before founding Republicans Against Trump and becoming publisher of The Bulwark, she worked as a Republican lobbyist and comms expert. This week, The Atlantic published a piece she wrote about her recent experience in running Republican focus groups, What GOP Voters Have Told Me Since Trump’s Indictment. She noted that “Despite leading the GOP to a historically bad midterm, being saddled with a dismal 25 percent approval rating, and becoming the first former president to be indicted, his prospects for winning the Republican nomination are only growing stronger. Since the indictment, Republicans— including those running against him— have rallied to Trump’s defense. His fundraising has surged. And he’s racked up endorsements. Meanwhile, his Republican opposition is floundering. Nikki Haley is apparently double-counting her fundraising. Mike Pence is getting booed by party hard-liners. Asa Hutchinson, Tim Scott, and Vivek Ramaswamy toil in also-ran obscurity. Ron DeSantis is the only candidate within hailing distance of Trump, but his campaign is sputtering. Over the course of hundreds of focus groups I’ve conducted, a large chunk of GOP voters have made clear that they would be content with a nominee other than Trump in 2024— preferably a ‘Trump without the baggage’–style candidate. They like that the former president is, in their words, a ‘fighter.’ But after eight years of Trump tweets, taunts, and tantrums, they’re open to— in many cases eager for— new alternatives. So how is Trump on pace to run away with the nomination?”
For a while, DeSantis looked like a plausible contender. In my focus groups, Republican voters admired the Florida governor’s “aggressiveness,” favorably citing his decision to ship migrants to Martha’s Vineyard. Others said they liked his approach to the pandemic and approvingly quoted his unofficial campaign slogan: “Florida is where woke goes to die.”
But I’ve seen a marked change in recent weeks. Trump and his super PAC are trying to paint DeSantis as a deficit hawk hell-bent on slashing Medicare and Social Security. These kinds of attacks are aimed at tying DeSantis to the establishment in the eyes of voters— a view that’s starting to creep into the focus groups.
“As I started to learn more about Ron DeSantis and where he is on the political spectrum and how he’s voted in the past, now I’m not sure I’d vote for the man,” Sharon, a two-time Trump voter from Illinois, told me. Others called him “alienating” and said they “aren’t necessarily comfortable” with his policies.
Criticism of his culture-war crusade against Disney has come up as well. “Everything about that is why I’m not necessarily a big fan of him,” said Wesley, a Republican from Maryland. “I get the impression that he very much governs to the people on the internet more so than the people in his state.”
Colleen, a Republican from Georgia, called DeSantis’s war with Disney “a little goofy,” saying, “It’s Disney World! Leave it alone.” Informed about DeSantis’s suggestion to build a prison next to the theme park, Ruth— a Michigan Republican— exclaimed, “Why would you do that? That’s terrible.”
As the base sours on DeSantis, it’s coming home to Trump. When I convened a group of GOP voters the day after Trump’s indictment, their assessment was nearly unanimous: “It’s a complete distraction and it’s a waste of time.” “It’s being blown out of proportion.” “Just ridiculous and a terrible direction for us to go.”
We asked one group whether they had donated to Trump before the indictment. Only three out of nine had, but after the indictment, all nine said they would. None said another indictment or arrest would change their minds. And none thought Trump should drop out.
“As far as a mug shot goes, he’s going to market the hell out of that,” said Chris, a two-time Trump voter from Illinois, imagining a future arrest. “Every one of us is going to buy one of those shirts.” Most hands went up when I asked who would buy one.
In the most recent group, five out of seven participants said they would vote for Trump if the primary were held that day.
One of the peculiar pathologies of Republican-primary politics is that even Trump’s competition feels unable to criticize him. Case in point: After Trump was indicted, DeSantis called the move “un-American,” Pence called it “an outrage,” and Haley said it was “more about revenge than it is about justice.”
They are in a trap of their own making. For eight years, Republican leaders have defended Trump at every turn— from the Access Hollywood tape to “very fine people on both sides.” From the first impeachment to January 6 to the second impeachment.
They thought that by covering for Trump they were tapping into his power, but they were actually giving away their own— mortgaging themselves and their reputations to Trump’s lies and depravities. By defending him then, they have made it impossible to credibly accuse him of anything now.
This problem is compounded by the deep relationship that Trump has cultivated with Republican voters. He’s been a constant presence in their lives for eight years— or, for Apprentice fans, much longer. They defended him on Facebook and argued about him over Thanksgiving dinners. Millions of them have voted for him twice.
DeSantis, in contrast, became a national figure only about 18 months ago. Some Republicans like his anti-“woke” stunts, but the fracas with Disney shows that this will get him only so far. The shallowness of this attachment is allowing Trump to define DeSantis for a national audience before DeSantis has the chance to define himself.
“I don’t know enough about him. I would have to learn more to see where he stands on a lot of things,” Sandy, a North Dakota Republican, said of DeSantis in a recent focus group. Many others echoed this idea.
The Trump camp is gleefully filling that information vacuum. The former president has called DeSantis “a total flameout,” “highly overrated,” and “a really bad politician.” His super PAC is skewering DeSantis as a pudding-fingered entitlement-slasher and “just another career politician.” DeSantis’s response has been almost nonexistent.
Unless the Republican field coalesces around an alternative soon, Trump will almost certainly cruise to the nomination— just as he did in 2016. Today, Trump is in the pole position, and gaining. Fox and CNN lifted their shadow bans on him. And, thanks to the indictment, he’s back in his sweet spot of aggrieved victimhood.
Already, parts of the Republican establishment are resigning themselves to another Trump coronation. Although DeSantis was once their great hope, the plan now— once again— seems to be to sit back and pray that the Democrats take care of Trump for them.