Stop Donald Trump Now or He'll be the 2024 Nominee
Trump's going to win the nomination if he runs in 2024
When you set out to take Vienna, take Vienna.- Napoleon
Donald Trump has come back from a host of scandals and crises that would tank anyone else. And each time, folks think, “Wow, they really have him this time.”
But each time he comes back. After the Access Hollywood tape, he was supposedly done. Tons of elected Republicans withdrew their endorsements. Then he won the election a month later, and they all came back.
Maybe this time is different. Even if Trump isn’t removed and barred from running for office again, maybe enough people will admit he actually lost the election that he’ll look like a loser. Maybe the putsch sours enough people that Trump is too weak to win again.
But Trump is still in a very, very strong position to be the 2024 GOP nominee if he’s not precluded from running. There will be a bevy of candidates. None of those candidates is likely to consolidate as the alternative to Trump. Even if 30% of the 2024 Republican electorate dislikes Trump—which isn’t even a sure bet, given Trump is at 70% with Republicans in most polls immediately after the coup—you’d need that 30% to be sufficient to beat Trump. And you’d need a guarantee the Trump alternative would garner 30%. Is that really a sure bet?
Trump will retain intense loyalty in 2024 from a ton of Republicans. He’s deeply popular with them, and although National Review might run back their “Against Trump” issue, they showed how few Republican primary voters care about what that magazine thinks.
The reality is that Trump has won a new class of voters, and that plenty of Romney 2012 voters are now Democrats. If you had the 2012 Republican primary with the modern Republican electorate, Rick Santorum would have won the nomination.
There’s also a negative feedback loop that strengths Trump with the 2024 Republican electorate. As Trump’s claims get crazier, more voters will shift to not being Republicans. The remaining Republicans and the most motivated folks to vote in the primary will be more loyal to Trump. I would be truly shocked if Trump is a 2024 Republican candidate and is not the nominee.
That’s why the Republicans need to vote for removal now. Beyond the overwhelming case that he’s guilty of inciting insurrection and deserves removal for that. Or the case that he deserves removal for trying to overturn the election by improperly pressuring Georgia’s Secretary of State, he needs to be removed so that he can never run for president again.
The GOP’s strategy against Trump has consistently been to appease his voters and hope that they can work with him. But they can’t do that anymore. He nearly got Mike Pence killed last week.
John McCain once said, “I’d rather lose an election than a war.” The GOP needs 19 Senators to decide they’d be okay losing an election to end the party’s hostile takeover by Donald Trump. If they don’t, they have only themselves to blame when he sweeps Iowa and New Hampshire in route to the 2024 Republican nomination.
Kendall Kaut is an assistant district attorney, sports editor and election analyst. If you like the newsletter, please forward it and tell others to subscribe (we’re moving way up on Substack and staying free while we grow). You can follow Kendall on Twitter @kendallkaut