How long now have we been almost obsessed with The Party Of Trump? Seemingly forever, right? Hell, if memory serves me correctly, some wags, myself included began calling it the Party of Trump all the way back when he steamrolled his way to the nomination in 2016, especially when he threatened to take his base and go home if he didn’t win, and the RNC basically threw in their hand. But there’s more to a political party than just the party.
After all, exactly what is a political party? At its heart, it is nothing more or less than an organization, just like any business. There is a structure, and a pecking order, and employees. It is the official organ to move forward the ideology and ideas of the group. But at its heart, it is an organization, with an agenda to push if it wants to make enough money to keep operating.
And in that sense, there is no doubt about it. This is The Party of Trump. And for 5 long years now, how often have you read, heard or seen, and how often have I and others like me written about potential cracks in Trump’s hold on the party? More times than any of us want to either count or recall, right?
But you know what? We were all, myself included, full of shit. As today’s RNC debacle shows, this is Trump’s party until it isn’t. But here’s the McGuffin. We weren’t wrong, we were just full of shit. Because we were failing to make a critical distinction.
A party is just an organization, made to promote a common ideology and platform, and Trump owns that lock, stock and barrel. But that’s just the organization. But an organization, no matter how well run, cannot elect anyone to office. In order to do that, the party needs voters, and a shit load of them. And that is the critical distinction we failed to make, and where Trump has his trouble.
2018 was a perfect example. In 2018 the GOP was all in on Trump, and the GOP and the RNC were all in. But actual GOP voters preferred genital lice to Trump, and made their opinions clear in polling. Trump and the GOP got plastered, the Democrats flipped 40 seats in the House, and most Democratic candidates out raised entrenched GOP incumbents by 3-4 to 1.
And that’s where it is starting to appear the GOP is again right now. A recent poll showed that Trump still enjoyed an 86% approval rating among registered Republicans, a whopping 59% of them want to see somebody else run for President in 2024. Now I’m not privileged to state secrets here, this is a public poll that the RNC has almost certainly seen.
Let’s have a little math fun, shall we? Let’s just start the GOP at 100%, cuz that’s easy. If 59% of registered GOP voters don’t want Trump to run again, that puts his support base at 41%, and he shouldn’t even be able to get through the primaries with that. If you start with Trump’s popularity level of 86%, and subtract 59% from that, then Trump’s core base is a truly pathetic 27%. And if you split the difference, then you’re still stuck with an anemic 34%. While the GOP may still be a non stop fluffing machine for Trump, it appears that more and more of the voters are so over him.
What’s the old saying? No man may serve two masters. And that’s what the RNC ia trying to do. On the one hand, they have a dictatorial Fuhrer who demands total compliance. And they have thrown in with him. But on the other hand, the actual voters who have to go into the booth and pull the lever are once again, as in 2018 saying, Enough is enough! The RNC and the GOP can fluff Trump until the cows come home, but if the actual voters either refuse to show up, or worse yet vote Democratic, thenn all of the voter suppression in the world won’t make any difference. Watch the GOP polls. If Trump’s popularity dips below 80%, then he is now officially a liability to the RNC. And if he can’t consistently pull a minimum of 55% for a 2024 run, then the GOP 2024 primaries are going to be a nightmare mosh pit. Don’t touch that dial.
Wunko’s, wackos and wierdos, fucking Republicans one and all. I fear because of the stupidity of Americans.
Murf, you erred a bit here:
“Let’s just start the GOP at 100%, cuz that’s easy. If 59% of registered GOP voters don’t want Trump to run again, that puts his support base at 41%, and he shouldn’t even be able to get through the primaries with that.”
It’s all going to depend on how many other folks throw their hats into the GOP’s ring. Also, it’s going to depend on how the primaries and caucuses award their delegates. In 2016, 16 states used the “winner-take-all” method (some of these states award some delegates as “at-large” and other delegates by Congressional district; Florida, for instance, had 18 “at-large” delegates and 81 from the Congressional districts, and since Trump won the state, he won all 99 delegates even though he only won 46% of the total primary vote). Another 13 states used the “winner-take-most” method (with the same “at-large”/Congressional district split; Alabama, for instance, had 26 “at-large” delegates and 21 from the Congressional districts, plus 3 state members from the RNC for a total of 50 delegates; Trump won the state with only 43% of the vote but took 36 of the 50 delegates).
Since there wasn’t really a formal primary season for the GOP in 2020, it’s possible that the RNC may make changes to the primaries with regard to how delegates are awarded (there is also a proportional allocation of delegates, done by 17 states; West Virginia has a “direct election” so that voters elect delegates directly and the delegates choose whether to be bound to a candidate or not while 3 states–CO, ND, WY–only awarded delegates at a later state convention). BUT . . . if no changes are made, Trump could easily walk away with the GOP nomination with as little as 41%. Heck, in 2016, Trump won 3 of the first 4 primaries which combined for 133 delegates. Trump got 82 of those delegates–50 from South Carolina alone (a winner-take-all state) where he only received 32.5% of the vote; he won NH and NV but as those two states award proportionally, he only got 25 of the two states’ 53 total delegates (he got 35.2% and 45.7% of the states’ vote, respectively).
Of course, the primaries generally attract the die-hard party voters so a base of just 41% could easily send Trump to the 2024 Convention with a majority of the delegates.
What Joseph said..