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Notes -
Do Trump Supporters Actually Want To Win?
Prompted by this sanctimonious, if interesting, FT column. Emphasis mine:
For a long time, a certain pro-Trump (or anti-anti-Trump, if you want) narrative on the 'intellectual right' was that there was no real alternative to Trump. Sure, they conceded that most criticisms of Trump-the-man were correct, but this was the Flight 93 Election. The alternatives were all versions of Mitt Romney or Marco Rubio, who didn't say the things Trump occasionally did. We can restate the Flight 93 theory like this:
DeSantis' presence complicates the Flight 93 theory. DeSantis has a record of some competence on conservative issues. Certainly not enough for the very online dissident right, but they had soured on Trump by late 2017 themselves, and so have no horse in this race. Whether DeSantis of Yale and Harvard is a 'true believer' is a complicated question, but then again the same could be said about Trump of New York via Wharton; the former certainly seems a much more capable administrator.
The column posits that Trump's success against DeSantis in this phony war stage of the 2024 primary campaign is a case of "vibes based politics" winning over 'substance based politics'. In 2016, intellectual conservatives could defend Trump because - whatever the vibes were - he was the only candidate on substance, too. In 2023, the banality of Trump's support is more clear. Ironically, it leads to a case for an interesting question - if Trump had merely attached his vibe to Ted Cruz' political platform in 2016, would he still have won? Was it less 'build the wall' and more who the frontman for building the wall was? The smart case for Trump would seem to be reducible to:
DeSantis is a "phony" or establishment conservative who will turn in office and resign himself to implementing the Mitch McConnell checklist of tax cuts, deregulation, more money for the military and cutting some welfare spending. The problem with this is that Trump was in office and accomplished little but (some of) the above, and hardly has a lifelong history of staunch conservative politics himself. If the problem is associating with elite circles, Trump has a long history of the same.
DeSantis can't win the presidential election even if he takes the primary, Trump can. This argument is more persuasive, if only because Trump's record shows he has technically convinced enough people in the right places to vote for him to show he can win. But Trump also lost a presidential election, never hit a 50% approval rating (even once, something Biden has apparently managed) and seems not to be experiencing any great groundswell of public support from swing voters. The promise of Trump is now tainted by the reality of Trump, so MAGA might ring slightly more hollow to those who aren't true believers.
I love this line because thinking about what your enemies fear is often an interesting thought experiment. Republicans are being presented with a choice between Trump and an American Viktor Orban. Nothing is settled, but they appear to strongly prefer the former.
No, if Ted Cruz's platform includes monkeying about with Social Security (which he supported as a Senator, but went quiet about once he started running for President). The fact that Trump was not affiliated with the traditional right wing of the Republican party and was therefore credible when he promised to protect Social Security and Medicare was critical to his ballot box success.
Trump would have lost to an empty suit in 2016 in the Democrats had managed to run one and did lose to an empty suit in 2020. Thinking that Trump is unusually popular with the median voter is "How could Nixon have won? Nobody I know voted for him" level stupid. DeSantis, on the other hand, was re-elected by a landslide in what used to be considered a purple slate.
Then how can we explain Trump's dominance over DeSantis in polls and prediction markets? He's currently at 70% to win the nomination, and he is slaughtering DeSantis in the polls.
https://www.metaculus.com/questions/11370/2024-republican-nominee-for-us-prez/
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/latest_polls/gop_primaries/
I'm sure name recognition plays a part, but as time goes by this becomes less and less credible. Republicans love Trump. They don't love DeSantis.
Certainly DeSantis has been popular in his own state, but this doesn't seem to translate to nationwide success. DeSantis might even win fewer non-Republicans than Trump. Trump seems to do well with some minority voters who love his machismo, even if he plays for the wrong team. DeSantis, with his high IQ and whiny voice, will not attract those voters. I hope I'm wrong, but 2024 seems to be a replay of 2016 for the Republican primaries, with Trump consistently being underestimated. He reaches people.
Those Prediction Markets are predicting the Republican nominee not the general election. It's totally plausible Trump is extremely popular with the Republican base and not popular with the general electorate.
But is DeSantis more popular with the general electorate? There was a time when this would have seemed plausible, but the headlines he's generated since he became the media's golden boy have all been related to whatever culture war bullshit he's promoting in his state. He painted himself into a corner and now he finds himself running to the right of Trump. Had he focused his campaign on administrative competence that vaguely hinted at effective implementation of MAGA-adjacent principles, I'd say he has a good chance of winning the general election. But the hasn't done that. He's publicly waged an all-out war against wokism and LGBT stuff, not to mention his quixotic war against Disney and the stunt where he sent immigrants from Texas up north. If he'd done these things quietly it may have provoked some kind of backlash but not nearly as much as centering his entire public persona around them. Plus, he seems unwilling to give interviews to anyone who will do anything other than lob softballs at him. It's nice work if you can get it, but he can't do this all the way through a fucking presidential election and expect to win. Remember, he needs to convince people in swing states who voted for Biden that he's the more reasonable candidate than Trump, and those states have all either stood pat when it was expected they may shift right a bit (Nevada, Arizona) or decisively shifted left (Pennsylvania, Michigan).
Trump was able to win in 2016 largely because he was a totally unknown entity running against a lousy Democtratic candidate. Once people knew what to expect, he lost. DeSantis doesn't have that advantage, and simply being a Trump who can wage the culture war better provided he has a compliant legislature isn't going to convince moderates and independents that he's much of an improvement.
I agree that Desantis probably misstepped in the sorts of attention he's been getting. But DeSantis seems less unpopular, at least, for the moment. I'm pretty confident that there exist many independents who would vote for DeSantis but not for Trump. 73% of independents dislike Trump. But we have a long way to go still, much could change.
Personally, with my current knowledge, I'd be willing to vote for DeSantis, but in all likelihood not Trump after all the fraud claims and the attempt to overturn the election.
I think DeSantis has more appeal for moderates than Trump, but I doubt it's enough to flip very many Biden votes. You say that you'd pick DeSantis over Trump yourself but unless you voted for Biden in 2020 your opinion doesn't really matter; it just means that DeSantis might do about as well as Trump did in 2020 while Trump himself would do worse. Last I checked that wasn't the goal of the candidacy.
Well, it would matter if other people's minds have changed. Biden's popularity has fallen since he was elected, I believe.
I'd voted 3rd party.
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