Best of Whether Donald Trump Will Be President Again
Revenge of the Donald
Nostalgia and resentment could be plenty to catapult Trump dorsum into the presidency.
About the author: David Frum is a staff writer at The Atlantic.
Losers don't usually get a second take chances in modern U.S. presidential politics. Dorsum in the days of nominating conventions and party bosses, an Adlai Stevenson or a Thomas Dewey could gain two consecutive nominations. Richard Nixon actually won the presidency in 1968 later on losing in 1960. Simply since the coming of primary contests, it's win—or retire. Even Al Gore, who won the popular vote in 2000, was debarred in 2004.
Donald Trump, who upended so many previous presidential precedents, at present seems likely to upend one more. Trump has to be considered the massive front-runner for the 2024 Republican nomination. He's already running hard, and he'south already dominating the field. Pull a fast one on News's intense promotion of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis as an culling to Trump is not working out any better in 2024 than its similar try on behalf of then–New Jersey Governor Chris Christie in 2016. Trump dominates in the polls. He has the lead in fundraising. Down-ballot races turn on loyalty to Trump. Potential rivals vow they will not run for president if Trump does.
It'due south an astonishing spectacle, because Donald Trump was no ordinary political loser. He was a huge political loser. He lost the popular vote in ii consecutive presidential elections, the second fourth dimension by a margin of 8 million votes. He led his party to a cruel midterm defeat in 2018 amidst the strongest economy since the late 1990s. He was the commencement president to have been impeached twice, the second fourth dimension for inciting a mob to invade and set on Congress to overturn a national election result. He at present faces more criminal and ceremonious jeopardy than Richard Nixon did ahead of his presidential pardon in 1974.
Trump is campaigning on ii themes: nostalgia for the stiff pre-pandemic economy, plus resentment over the outcome of the vote in 2020. It's non much, only it's enough—enough to force DeSantis, the would-be Trump replacement, into desperate stunts to testify himself Trumpier than Trump: handing out $5,000 rewards to cops who decline vaccination; identifying himself with a state surgeon general who advises anti-vaxxers to trust their "intuitions."
But nobody is Trumpier than Trump. At that place'due south no Trumpism that's bigger than Trump. "It's virtually a movement, not a human being" is a venerable cliché practical to populist politics. In this case, though, it's nigh a man, not a motion. In 2016, Trump endorsed allowing transgender people to "use the bathroom they feel is advisable." In 2017, he crammed through a huge taxation cutting for the rich. On the eve of the coronavirus pandemic, Trump was negotiating a giveaway trade deal with Red china. Those are all supposed populist no-no'southward. Trump followers paid no mind. If Trump does it, it's okay. They don't much care well-nigh the content of his politics. They care almost its mood.
Everyone who follows politics even casually can see the Trump comeback emerging. Well-sourced reporters advisedly detail the improvement's mechanics. But almost nobody is prepared for the malicious destructiveness of what is to come.
In a 2011 speech, Donald Trump explained his unmarried top rule in life: "Get even with people. If they screw you, screw them back 10 times as hard. I really believe it." He's repeated the same thought over and over once more in speeches, tweets, and books published under his byline. In 2024, the targets of Trump's revenge are American constabulary and American republic. At a September 25 rally in Perry, Georgia, Trump excoriated state Republican officials who failed to subvert the country election for him. In Iowa two weeks later, Trump delivered more attacks on the 2020 election process, focusing this time on country Republicans who failed to steal Arizona for him.
In 2016 and through the early part of Trump'southward presidency, there was oft an edge of Friars Club comedy to Trump's rally performances: non very dainty comedy, a fiddling out of style in tone and sensibility, but comedy all the aforementioned. Non in 2021. Now information technology's all dark and bitter.
Here's video from a Georgia television receiver station of the entirety of Trump's Perry rally. Trump'southward ain speech starts at i:37:38. Watch equally much as yous can stand up and tell me if you detect even a moment of sense of humour, Friars Order or otherwise. The most quoted scrap—Trump's quasi-endorsement of the Democrat Stacey Abrams as a better governor for Georgia than the Republican Brian Kemp—is not whatsoever kind of joke. Information technology's a deliberately delivered challenge, lower jaw jutting beyond the upper teeth, eyes slitted with anger.
That'south the guy who wants to render as the 47th president.
In Trump'southward start term, the country was protected to some degree by his ignorance and ineptitude. He kept trying to practice bad things, but it took him a while to effigy out how the controls operated, where the kill-switches were located. By the fourth dimension of his attempt to extort the Ukrainian president, in 2019, Trump had achieved a higher degree of mastery. Just past and then it was too late. Then the pandemic struck, and Trump bumped into a new wall of failure. In a 2d Trump presidency, however, the burglars will go far already knowing how to bypass the alarms and disable the locks. He'll understand that it's non enough to install an ally as attorney general—he must control the secondary and tertiary ranks of the Justice Department too. He won't allow himself to be talked into another chief of staff with an independent sense of duty, such equally John Kelly, who averted much harm from the middle of 2017 to the kickoff of 2019. It'll be Mark Meadows types from 24-hour interval one to day last. And he'll bring with them a new generation of Republican officeholders whose top priority volition be rearranging their states' ballot laws then that Republicans practice not lose ability even if they lose the vote.
That's the future Trump is preparing.
Be prepare.
Source: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/10/trump-running-president-2024-election/620502/
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