Posted on 11/02/2020 9:05:15 AM PST by Kaslin
Even if Trump loses, he'll remain the most popular Republican in the country—and the leading candidate for the 2024 GOP nomination.
Yesterday, President Trump held five rallies in five different states, barnstorming through Michigan, Iowa, North Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. On Saturday, he did four rallies in Pennsylvania alone, including one that drew 57,000 people to the small town of Butler about 30 miles north of Pittsburgh.
All Trump rallies are celebratory affairs, but these seemed even more so. Trump himself was in a jaunty mood, doing a little dance to “Y.M.C.A.” on a freezing stage in Michigan, laughing along with the crowd at Biden memes, and generally hamming it up for his supporters, who came out in droves.
For weeks now, the mainstream media have been telling us how Trump’s flurry of eleventh-hour campaigning is a sign of desperation, but as usual they miss the mark. What these rallies really show is that win or lose, Trump isn’t going away after this election. He’s the most popular Republican in the country by far—and will remain so, no matter what happens on Tuesday.
Butler County, PA.
I’ve never seen anything like it — just a sea of people. pic.twitter.com/VYImRB710v
— #ThePersistence (@ScottPresler) November 1, 2020
If Twitter blue checks weren’t so busy denouncing Trump rallies as COVID-19 superspreader events or “the stuff of Nazi rallies,” as one Vox blogger put it, they might notice how these events are more than just campaign rallies; they’re manifestations of a fundamental shift that’s taken place in American political life.
The enthusiasm Trump inspires among his supporters is new in the modern era. Obama might have moved a bunch of Hollywood celebrities to make that embarrassing “Yes We Can” video in 2008 and that hagiographic biopic “Barry” in 2016, but he never inspired the kind of organic manifestations of Trump support we’ve seen from ordinary Americans: boat and ATV parades, massive highway caravans, homemade Trump flags, signs, tambourines, and all manner of Trump Americana cropping up at makeshift roadside stands.
Over the weekend, while Trump was staging his whirlwind of closeout rallies, caravans for Trump, most of them organized by local people with no connection to the Trump campaign, once again appeared all over the country from San Diego to New Jersey.
This isn’t the kind of thing that will simply dissipate if Trump loses to Joe Biden. Even out of power, he will command the loyalty of a large enough swath of voters so as to control the Republican Party, informally. The free-wheeling interview Trump did with Dave Portnoy of Barstool Sports back in July was a preview of the Trump presence we’re likely to see if he’s ousted from the White House: a chatty ex-president celebrity with his own cable channel, broadcasting directly to his fervent base of supporters. You might hear more from Trump, not less, if he loses.
As for party politics, the mainstream pundits prognosticating about who’ll emerge to lead the GOP in the event of a Trump loss don’t seem to realize that it will be Trump himself. Imagine their surprise when a defeated Trump comes back to run for the Republican nomination in 2024, and wins it. (He’d be as old as Biden is now.)
The larger point here is that American politics changed permanently in 2016, and there’s no getting out of it with a Biden win. We’re in a populist era now, and we will be for the foreseeable future, even without Trump in the White House.
That’s because Trump is not the cause of the change, he is just a powerful manifestation of it. The cause of the change was the wholesale failure of our elites and the collapse of public trust in our elite-run institutions. Trump called out those failures in a way no one had done before, and it resonated with many Americans who had become so disgusted with our politics they had given up, tuned it out, stopped voting.
Future Trump-like candidates, whether Republican or Democrat, who can convince voters they aren’t in thrall to special interests and aren’t controlled by the establishment, will command the loyalty of enough voters to reshape national elections. Think Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on the left and Sen. Josh Hawley or South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem on the right. One thing is for sure: for the GOP, it won’t be the likes of Sen. Ben Sasse or Nikki Haley. That brand of politician will be powerless to influence the Republican Party moving forward, even if Trump loses.
The fact is, a Trump loss this cycle means Trump will instantly become the leading candidate for the 2024 Republican nomination. And if you don’t believe that, you haven’t been to a Trump rally.
Losing is for losers and there are only two losers in this race - B-H.
If they cheat President Trump out of re-election, we will never again have a Republican President.
The Democrat/Communist party will see to that.
I’ve read that since the advent of TV, the more charismatic presidential candidate wins 100% of the time.
This year? Hah. No contest.
No Trump isn’t going away, win or lose. And his core base of supporters aren’t going to abandon him, either, so he’s going to be the head of the Republican Party for years to come. It’s his party now.
If Trump loses he will be persecuted literally to death by the left.
No, this is Trump’s last shot at being elected, if he were to lose. If he were to lose, he would be hounded day and night til the end of time by Dems looking for revenge.
Once out of office, the Dems will makes sure the lawsuits and indictments will fly and he won’t have the protection of the office.
“And his core base of supporters aren’t going to abandon him, either, so he’s going to be the head of the Republican Party”
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No, it doesn’t go that way. He would be a man without a party, if he were to lose. He would have to go the Ross Perot route.
I can’t picture Trump as another Grover Cleveland...
Below are the real polls! Not the B$ posted ad nausea on FR, posing as polls!
Patriots of Arizona - 96 mile long Trump Train / Staging Rally - 2020/10/25
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlWcFgS4720&feature=emb_logo
Vote like your life depends on our President winning. It does!
Frankly, I could see myself just adopting a very self-centered attitude, focusing only on those things I can control, and walking away from politics completely. I can't imagine I'd even walk across the street to attend a rally held for any of the other various losers the GOP has been running for President in the last 25 years.
Trump is transforming the GOP. It’s not the “Bush Party” anymore.
I see DeSantis as the one who will have the torch passed to him.
I think Trump hammers away because he wants the most decisive victory possible. No slacking off just because he thinks he’s done enough to win.
Agreed. And just a few (of the many) reasons why:
1. If Trump looses, the vote fraud will have been massive and NOT limited to the Presidential race only.
2. The commies WILL pack the court. They will add 5 liberal activist judges who will create a majority socialist super legislature that is unelected/unaccountable.
3. They will add corrupt D.C. and desperately poor Puerto Rico to statehood. That adds 4 additional (D) Senators, ~5-6 additional (D) Reps in the House and 2 additional (D) governors.
They will be well on their way to eliminating the Electoral College, effectively meaning California and New York elect the President.
“Frankly, I could see myself just adopting a very self-centered attitude, focusing only on those things I can control, and walking away from politics completely.”
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If he were to lose, I can see that’ll it’ll be every man for himself for the next four years, at least. Trump would be busy fighting nonstop legal battles, anyway. It’s true that “victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan”.
If he loses he will take over for Rush.
If so then unlike Perot he's going to have a significant percentage of the electorate following him.
That is 100% true. He is running for his life and property, and that of his heirs, and ours as well. The Manhattan DA operation will be moved to the DOJ. He will be made an example, and no one like him will ever emerge again.
“If so then unlike Perot he’s going to have a significant percentage of the electorate following him.”
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Could be, but Americans aren’t usually that big on “cult of personality” campaigns. If it were the 1800s it might be different.
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