Though MAGA Republicans have not fared well in the midterms, it still may not be time to dump Trump.
Never before in the postwar history of the United States have the results of a midterm election perceived as decisive for a major party’s nomination for President two years later. As things stand now, Republicans are headed toward regaining control of the United States House of Representatives (which they lost in 2018), with three Senate seats yet to be called. Given that states in the US employ different systems of balloting, entailing a time-consuming counting process, the final results may indeed take weeks to pour in.
There is no doubt that a Republican wave was predicted by the media, if not as a tribute to the electoral appeal of former President Donald J. Trump, but in direct proportion to the frustration with the presidency of Joe R. Biden, Jr. of Delaware, 46th President of the United States. President Biden has not much success to show by way of reining in spiralling inflation, or controlling crime (including gun violence) and illegal immigration. America’s borders are not secure. Though the worst of the pandemic has passed, the Biden Administration had failed miserably to stem its spread and keep the number of deaths down. The promise of Build Back Better has not been matched by performance.
In fact, performance has been replaced by rhetoric, with the President and his party coming down heavily on his predecessor and his MAGA (Make America Great Again) Republicans, calling them everything—from “anti-abortion zealots” to “threats to democracy”. Political Action Committees (PACs) of the Democratic Party are even reported to have gone to the extent of funding the election efforts of MAGA Republican candidates, handpicked by President Trump, at the stage of primaries to ensure they got their party’s nomination only to be defeated by Democrats in the general election. The veracity of this claim is subject to evidence but, if true, reflects poorly on the GOP (Grand Old Party or Republicans) and the organizational capabilities of the former President.
Apart from the trickling of the so-called Republican wave, which President Trump and his supporters in the Republican Party had come to believe in and Democrats feared, the most remarkable development in the midterms is the reelection of Republican Governor Ronald Dion “Ron” DeSantis of Florida with record margins and his emergence as a serious challenger to President Trump for the Republican nomination of 2024. It is evident that more than the Governor himself, the media is supremely excited about the prospect of a GOP primary race between him and the former President, who had promised a “big” announcement after the midterm results were out.
Whether President Trump is crestfallen with the nationwide failure of MAGA Republicans to get elected to Congress or whether he saw the wisdom behind the advice of his party colleagues to hold back the announcement for the time being is open to speculation. But the announcement of a 2024 run, expected from an effusive President Trump in the event of a Republican sweep of Congress, which he had no doubt worked hard toward, is yet to happen. President Trump, who had derisively nicknamed the Florida governor “Ron DeSanctimonious”, has also warned him against a 2024 bid for the Republican nomination. Evidently, the 45th President would want to lose neither the control of his party nor the race for his party’s nomination two years later. Curiously, even the conservative media is strongly advising Republicans and Republican voters who had embraced the policies of Donald Trump to dump him and go for Ron DeSantis instead.
Republicans opposed to Donald Trump, when he held office as America’s 45th President, had started promising that they would primary him in 2020. That did not happen as the party chose to rally behind the President during the pandemic. If Republicans in 2024 deny Trump the nomination, there is every reason to believe—given his single-point ambition to get back to the White House—that he would launch a third party and run as its candidate for President of the United States. Along with him will walk out of the GOP the MAGA Republicans (including his core supporters and his handpicked candidates defeated this year). In such an event, seemingly unlikely at the moment, Donald Trump and his supporters would cut into the votes of the GOP, thus ensuring a reelection for President Biden.
Interestingly, President Biden, despite his lacklustre performance and record low approval ratings for an incumbent President, expects not only to be renominated by his party but reelected as President as well. But progressives in the Democratic Party, unimpressed by the President’s poor scorecard and his advancing age (he is not only the oldest elected President but is all set to become the oldest incumbent to seek reelection, if not otherwise denied the nomination) are already talking about the “need” to replace the President with a new candidate in 2024. No President in recent history who has sought his party’s nomination has ever been refused. In fact, the last incumbent President to face a primary was from Biden’s own party, James Earl “ Jimmy” Carter of Georgia, in 1980. That year, US Senator Edward Moore “Ted” Kennedy (D-MA), the only Kennedy brother then alive, had challenged President Carter for their party’s nomination, complaining about a “crisis of confidence” in the 39th President’s leadership. Carter went ahead to win his party’s nomination, only to lose to Ronald Wilson Reagan of California in the general election.
If President Biden is denied his party’s nomination in 2024, it will amount to an admission of his failures by his party. Biden or no Biden, Republicans would not want to let go of the chance to recapture the White House in 2024. If Republicans veer away from Donald Trump at this juncture, it will end up alienating him and pushing him out of the party. That may not augur well for their chances two years later. Pitting the Right against the Far Right is not a good idea. It is certainly not the time to dump Trump.
Saumyajit Ray, PhD Assistant Professor in United States Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.