Is Donald J. Trump electable?
Most people would say, not just no, but hell no. Senator Lindsey Graham says that the real estate billionaire is “the most unelectable Republican I’ve seen in my lifetime.”
Which is why the GOP establishment is in such a tizzy. Even if they did support Trump’s policy positions (they don’t), he would be a certain loser in the general election. Hillary Clinton would sweep the nation and take the White House in a landslide, while wiping out the GOP’s majorities in the House and Senate. As Graham states: “Every problem [the Republican Party] had in 2012, he’s made worse.”
This is, of course, the conventional wisdom: that not only would Trump lose spectacularly, but that he would further damage the GOP brand among the “coalition of the ascendant” – Hispanics, single women, millennials. What’s worse, he would leave them with a bad taste in their mouth that would sully the GOP’s reputation for a generation or more.
But the conventional wisdom is often wrong. Especially, pronouncements from the Republican establishment should be viewed with skepticism. These are the people who thought Hillary Clinton was the inevitable Democratic nominee in 2008, completely missing the Obama phenomenon. These are the people who thought Obama was a certain one-term president and Mitt Romney’s business background made him the perfect candidate in 2012 – completely overlooking the fact that he completely lacked the “common touch” necessary for victory.
These are the same people who insisted that it was impossible – impossible! – for the Obama campaign to get a higher turnout from their base than four years ago. These are the same people who considered Jeb Bush the inevitable nominee this time around – completely oblivious to the fact that Jeb Bush was never, never, never going to win in the most anti-establishment climate the party has ever seen.
And, of course, these are the people who continue to wonder aloud about the appeal of Donald Trump. These might be fine people, but their ability to predict the future of their party, much less the country, is very much in question. And indeed, when it comes to politics, the conventional wisdom is usually wrong – I have noticed the higher the office in question, the more likely it is to be turned on its head.
Which is a very long and convoluted way of saying that I would not underestimate Trump’s appeal in a general election. Yes, he has his faults, and those have been elaborated upon extensively. But he also brings some things to the table that other candidates do not. In particular, he appeals to the white working class (still an important commodity in states like Ohio and Pennsylvania) in ways that other candidates do not. While I think he’ll struggle to win Hispanics, I’m willing to predict that he would do much better with the African American vote than one might expect. And notably, other than immigration he has not emphasized social issues – single women and gays might be more amenable to nominee Trump than a more traditional Republican.
But most importantly, the reason I would not declare Trump DOA in the general can be represented by this graph:
Back in May, only 23% of Republicans said they would even consider voting for Trump. Now that number has risen to 65%. Trump completely turned around his image with GOP voters in less than ten months.
One might say, well, those are Republicans. They’re gullible. Perhaps. But back of all this is Trump’s ability to completely own the news cycle. He plays the media like a fiddle. And because of it, he is able to shape the conversation in ways the other candidates aren’t able to do. Put simply, the abilities that have allowed Trump to dominate the primary aren’t likely to disappear in the general. If he’s the nominee, in all likelihood he’ll be the one setting the agenda – and those who set the agenda tend to win.
I would also be wary about declaring Clinton the inevitable victor in a contest against Trump for two reasons. One, she’s demonstrably a weak candidate. We saw that in 2008 against Barack Obama and we’re seeing it now against Bernie Sanders. Two, her actions are the subject of an FBI investigation. I would advise against betting on the inevitable election of a candidate with both those qualities.
This is not to say that Trump is the next president, or even that he’ll win the nomination. The conventional wisdom may very well be correct. This post is only to warn against those making grand sweeping pronouncements about what the future holds. They’re almost certain to be wrong.
John Wynne is the “conservative voice” at PoliticsNC, where he also provides polling analysis and commentary on legislative campaigns. When not writing about politics, he enjoys gardening and listening to opera. Contact: johncwynne@gmail.com.
Well sh(oo)t, has anyone looked at the approval ratings for congress, our professional politicians (14% or so) and Trump (??)?. Are you so sure Trump isn’t electable in a general election with all us non-politicians voting. And much as I admire Ms Clinton, why is she any less toxic than she was 25 years ago when everyone hated her and her political (working with congress, etc) abilities were so terrible. She is still the same, foot in mouth, secretive, prone to real stupidity she was back then. I look at the field of candidates and frankly, while Trump has a really good clown act, and spouts the latest politially approved (by repubs) nonsense, and he looks like a much better choice than any of the others (who are, by the way, spouting the same nonsense but are that despised by the electorate creature, a professional politician.
“…..and he (Trumps) looks like a much better choice than any of the others….” Wow. Really?
Your opinion. Mine is that if Trump is a bigoted blowhard who is not qualified to be POTUS.
If he’s nominated (which I don’t think he will be), it will be a major political surprise. And if he wins in Nov 2016, it (1) will be the biggest election upset in US political history; (2) will prompt incredible divisiveness and civic unrest across the nation; and (3) will lead to articles of impeachment being filed and his removal from office by the third year of his term. And if he chooses a fraud like himself as his VP running mate (which I think he will, given his recent remarks that he thinks Palin would be a good choice for one of his cabinet positions), this nation will be unraveling in a bad way for a full 4 years, and the GOP will be end its long run as one of the two major political parties in the US.
Hillary Clinton is a lot of things; most all of them in the mediocre to bad range. Stupid however isn’t among them anywhere on the scale.
I believe she thinks herself so superior that she can spin, negotiate, and bully her way out of or around any entanglement she happens to encounter. The fallacy with that is, she isn’t a majority of one in the smart column.
The far right has not kidnapped the GOP? Really? Wow! My, my, I stand corrected.
Guess I’ll have to figure out other explanations for the following:
-John Boehner (quit House Speakership and Congress in total frustration over his party’s conservative hardliners)
-Eric Cantor (primaried out of office, and thus the House Majority Leader post, by his party’s conservative hardliners)
-Kevin McCarthy (heir apparent for House Speakership who withdrew his name when he felt he couldn’t win full support of his party’s conservative hardliners)
-Freedom Caucus (approx. 42 GOP hardliners who essentially dictate what happens with House agenda and legislation)
-Federal Government Shutdown – Oct 2013 (due to a snit over Obamacare, led the GOP’s conservative hardliners)
-RINO (“Republican In Name Only”; nickname coined and used by arch-conservatives for moderate/centrist Republicans who don’t toe the conservative hardliner line)
HEADLINES (ripped from the news):
-“House Conservatives Vowing Not to Raise Debt Limit”
-“The Freedom Caucus’ Unprecedented Insurgency”
-“Meet the Right-Wing Rebels Who Overthrew John Boehner”
-“The House Speakership Disaster: The Republican Party’s search for a new House Speaker been an unmitigated disaster”
A.L., don’t be misled by hyperbolic news headlines. Almost every example you point to involves the U.S. House of Representatives, where far right Republicans hold anywhere from 60 to at most 90 seats out 245 or so total GOP reps. And the U.S. House is just one of a number of political institutions currently controlled by the GOP.
In the U.S. Senate, hard right conservatives hold no more that 15 to 20 seats out of a total of 54 Republicans. Republicans Governors now hold office in 32 states, and few of them are considered far right. GOP-controlled state legislatures run the gamut from very conservative to moderately conservative.
So while the far right is an important player in GOP politics, traditional conservatives still dominate most political venues. And as you imply, if Trump were elected President, he would likely govern much more from the middle/right than from the far right. So as with the Democrat Party, which will reject the far left candidacy of Bernie Sanders, traditional conservatives will continue to hold the balance of power within the GOP.
Hopes this helps you understand the dynamics at play in today’s Republican Party.
Must you repeat the false statement that there’s an FBI investigation of Hillary Clinton? This has been proven false so many times I can’t believe you have the cojones to revive it here.
Until that moment I found some reasonably sensible points in your argument; that lie put the lie to the rest of your thinking.
I disagree with the things that John has to say most days. Likewise, decency and fairness dictate that if he is not wrong, then I should likewise make note of it. It would appear that an investigation of some sort is on going. So John didn’t lie or exaggerate based on the evidence.
http://www.examiner.com/article/fbi-investigation-will-doom-hillary-clinton-suggests-former-u-s-attorney
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/11/hillary-clinton-email-fbi-probe-215630
The Politico piece dates back to November and uses the word “probe”, but it is still an investigation.
Has anyone else noticed that Big Media have completely changed their tune over the last few weeks?
They’ve started to treat Trump and Sanders like they are actually credible candidates, instead of their usual “Hilary Snow White and the Seven GOP Dwarves” crap.
What is up with that??? Do they know something that is not being reported?
I think on the Dem side, it’s simply the press coming to terms with the polling numbers in Iowa and NH. Bernie could win both those primaries.
On the GOP side, I agree with what most pundits started saying this week. The Republican Party, especially its establishment side, has reached the realistic conclusion that Trump is in it to win it, that not only is he not going away, but in fact his star is still rising, that the chances of him saying anything too crazy that will “take him out” are slim, and that gaining the nomination looks now to be a two-horse race between Trump and Cruz. And, by virtue of all of those sobering realities, the GOP (as well as those in the media) are simply starting to ask themselves who of those two is the lesser of two evils.
Unlike Cruz, Trump is not seen as an unyielding conservative ideolog, but rather as a very identifiable media “star” who has solidified an ardent mix of supporters (some Tea Partiers, some evangelicals, many angry white worker class’ers and nativists), AND, more importantly, can still be influenced to change or soften his positions and his views. And, as such, he’s not seen as being as bad a choice as Cruz.
Of course, Cruz being detested by most everybody in the GOP establishment, by an overwhelming majority of his GOP Senate colleagues, by most in the media, and pretty much by anybody who has ever gotten to know him hasn’t helped his cause.
Only way to sum this up is with a few words from Hunter S. Thompson.
“When the going gets weird, the weird go pro.“
I’m part of that dying breed, the Yellow Dog Democrat, and at the left end of the Progressive scale to boot, but I tend to agree that it’s a mistake to underestimate Trump. He’s a buffoon and a clown — does he go home at night and practice making those faces and “takes” in front of a mirror? — but the old Joe the Plumber crowd and a surprising number of others like what he says. I’d bet he’d win North Carolina in a race with Hillary, for example.
Trump is an unprincipled demagogue and a populist and maybe even a racist and neofascist, but he has tapped into some of the dark streams of American consciousness. He’ll get blue collar voters, angry voters of all stripes and if this latest downward economic turn keeps going on, he’ll pick up even more votes from those who think a rich guy can solve America’s problems. In the end I suspect even moderate and evangelical/Tea Party Republican’ts would end up holding their noses and voting for him.
The only thing that gives me some hope is that I don’t see Trump bringing out a lot of grassroot voters to work hard for him. They’ll attend his rallies and enjoy a laugh and a dig at the politicians, but I doubt they’ll knock on doors for him in large numbers.
Oh, my goodness! The world’s o’kilter! Our resident neo-conservative offering a sobering and reality-based prospect on the nature and ramifications of a Trump presidency!
Might this show that even uber-conservatives worry about the major damage The Donald could do to the party they have kidnapped, as well as to the country they hope to return to yesteryear?
No need to over react to a somber analysis of Trump’s candidacy. The world is not out of kilter and I am no “uber- conservative,” as I generally support support traditional conservatives like Richard Burr and Virginia Foxx against their far right opponents.
I suspect that Trump, if elected, would not govern as a far right conservative, but would swerve erratically from one side to the other, disappointing his conservative supporters while gaining little support from his detractors. IMO, he lacks of any basic philosophical principles to guide his decisions and would need to rely on a cadre of expert advisors to have any chance of being an effective chief executive.
The “uber-conservatives” have not “kidnapped” the Republican Party, just as the far left Sanders’ socialists will not dominate the Democrat Party. Both factions will be important players in their respective parties, but when all the campaign hype is over, traditional forces will dominate.
While I subscribe generally to the conventional wisdom that Trump would lose a General Election and take down much of the GOP with him, I’ll concede that he might defy the odds under certain circumstances. But if Trump were to be elected President, he would do major, long-term damage to the Republican Party.
Trump’s inability to accomplish some of his more preposterous proposals such as extraditing all illegals and making Mexico pay for a border wall would quickly lead to major disenchantment among his working class supporters. His dogmatic views on international trade would turn American business against him from the outset. His lack of diplomacy would lead to strained relations with our allies and exacerbate tensions with our adversaries. His dearth of political skills would put him at odds with both Congressional Republicans and Democrats. And any over-the-top executive action he took would, in all likelihood, be overturned by the Courts.
In short, Trump lacks the skills to be an effective political leader. He would soon find his business acumen and his penchant for bluster and for bullying his adversaries to be of little value in trying to lead a divided nation and to be detrimental to the need for American leadership in world affairs. He would likely only be a one-term President if, indeed, he were to last that long.
With millions of illegal aliens swarming the country and taking American jobs, a lot of people are not interested in questioning Trump because he’s voicing their frustration. Was in Durham the other day and was surprised to hear a lot of African-Americans talking very favorably about Trump, and given the unemployment stats for African-Americans, it’s understandable. Of course, I doubt Trump actually believes what is coming out of his own mouth but the rest of us won’t find that out until after he’s elected.
If Trump wins the nomination, he will lose the general election, and hurt and embarrass his party in the process. I am not saying he will lose in a landslide; just that he will lose, no matter if it’s to HRC or to Sanders.
He will mostly make a fool of himself in his campaign and in debates (I know, I know, hasn’t he already?). Maybe not so much in the eyes and minds of most conservatives Republicans (who couldn’t distinguish between a blowhard, nativistic, bigoted fascist and Pope Francis if they tried). But certainly in the opinion of Dems, and of progressives, and of RINOs (if enough of those near-extinct critters can be found), and of a big chunk of those in the center. And when he loses, he will put the US Senate back into Dem hands, and the GOP’s House majority will narrow.
And the GOP strategy sessions in early 2017 will again see Republicans discussing how they can stop being “the party of the stupid,” become the “big tent” party, and capture (or, better yet, prevent) more Hispanic and AfAm votes in 2020.
A Trump nomination would not necessarily result in the GOP losing the US House. Gerry mandering has made competitive US House districts lean Republicon and even solid Republicon, and Republicons outnumber Democrats 246 to 188. I agree that he is moderate in many respects (e.g. Medicare and Social Security).
Ellen Brown’s book called “The Web of Debt” is a must read on the topic of the banks, the banking system and the Federal Reserve.
As for Trump, I concur that he will be more formidable than predicted which is why a contrast with a candidate like Bernie Sanders and his platform is the antidote.
Who are these ruling elite? The five too-big-to-fail banks that own the Federal Reserve. Nice arrangement, wouldn’t you agree? As Henry Ford once said: ‘if the people understood the banking system foisted upon them, there would be revolution’. How many of us understand the ‘fractional reserve banking system’ used by the Federal Reserve? It’s past time we did.
The only reason either Trump or Clinton are viable candidates today is because the corporate owned US. media is making them the chosen contenders; for those wondering why the media would pursue such a vile scheme, it is simple: either one of these ‘pathetic spectacles of a candidate’ will keep the country ruinously divided and everyone at each other’s throat. In this way, the US. ruling elites reign of fascism is safeguarded, perpetual war for corporate profit can proceed unabated and the independent, privately owned bank called the ‘Federal Reserve’ can continue enslaving the country in insurmountable debt by continuing to charge our government interest to use its own money – and with a national debt at 19 trillion dollars, that interest amounts to a lot of money! What caused our national debt to be so great? Social security? NO, social security has alway generated a surplus, which our elected officials borrow and spend, with the stipulation that it will be paid back – and that’s why they want SS. dismantled, they don’y want to honor their IOU’s to the people. The cost of running the federal government? NO. Medicare/medicaid or unemployment insurance? No. Surplus military spending, 1,000 overseas military bases, the weaponization of our atmosphere and deep space and war making in general? BINGO!!