As the Republican race for the nomination proceeds and serial sex abuser Donald Trump (SSAT) maintains his solid grip on the party’s voters, those Republicans who have wearied of SSAT and think that he will drag the party down again just like he did in 2018, 2020, and 2022 are starting to panic, especially as Ron DeSantis, their one-time hope to topple SSAT, seems to be floundering, There are fears within the party leadership that the crowded field of aspirants will enable SSAT to do what he did in 2016, to pick off each one until he is the last person standing. It is worse this time because he starts with a formidable lead.
This has led people like Mitt Romney to urge all the other candidates and donors to quickly coalesce around one person and for all the others to withdraw so that SSAT could be defeated. He did not specify which candidate should be the consensus one.
In an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, Romney, a Utah senator who was governor of Massachusetts before becoming the Republican nominee in 2012, said: “Despite Donald Trump’s apparent inevitability, a baker’s dozen [13] Republicans are hoping to become the party’s 2024 nominee for president.
“That is possible for any of them if the field narrows to a two-person race before Mr Trump has the nomination sewn up.
“For that to happen, Republican mega-donors and influencers – large and small – are going to have to do something they didn’t do in 2016: get candidates they support to agree to withdraw if and when their paths to the nomination are effectively closed.
“That decision day should be no later than, say, 26 February, the Monday following the contests in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.”
This will never happen. Politicians have big egos and each one of the aspirants will think that they should be the consensus candidate and all the other should withdraw in their favor. In fact, this article argues that the attempt to clear the field has already been tried this time around and may have actually backfired and ended up helping SSAT.
Mitt Romney is very worried about a divided Republican field electing Donald Trump, just like he argues a similar one did in the 2016 primaries. So much so that he’s publicly asking donors to cut off support to any candidate who’s not getting it done by the South Carolina primary next February.
He doesn’t have much to worry about. The “divided field” concern — a staple of election commentary since Trump’s first nomination — is a classic case of generals fighting the last war.
…It’s not just that it’s premature, though: The obsession with the divided field that elected Trump in 2016 has arguably damaged Republicans’ chances of defeating him in 2024.
The reason why is that Republicans skeptical of a third Trump run already took Romney’s lesson to heart years ago. Since the moment Biden took office, they began uniting behind Ron DeSantis to get around this very problem. The Murdoch media empire went about enthusiastically promoting his work in Florida and downplaying Trump for awhile, big donors threw record amounts of cash at his less-than-competitive re-election campaign, and numerous potential candidates decided against a run, with some even citing their fear of —you guessed it — a divided field.
Getting behind DeSantis early made sense, on paper. He had unique advantages that made him look compelling as a candidate who could appeal to both traditional and MAGA Republicans.
The good news for Republicans is that it briefly worked. DeSantis started the year as the near-undisputed heavyweight champion of the non-Trump field against a bunch of rivals polling near the margin of error. At one point, he was even threatening to overtake Trump.
The bad news is that DeSantis hasn’t lived up to the billing. His campaign has not looked competent, his personal charisma has been less than compelling, and he’s still settling on a clear message that can rally supporters and put Trump on the defensive.
The primary process is meant to democratically winnow out the candidates by giving voters a say until one person emerges. It replaced the former system where a small group of party insiders and bigwigs met and decided who should be the nominee. Romney’s plan seems to suggest that he thinks that the primary system is broken.
It is not the system that is broken, though, it is the party itself that is broken. They have allowed themselves to become an SSAT cult in which lies are seen as truth and almost any wild-eyed conspiracy is seen as not just plausible but actually true. And the entire Republican party has colluded in creating this situation by not vociferously denouncing the lies and instead remaining silent or actually endorsing them. Romney should be aiming his fire at the party leadership.
They have created this monster and returning to backroom dealmaking is not going to solve it.
I feel so sorry for them (heavy sarcasm).
I think I have located one major problem common for the GOP candidates.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pathological_lying
They have created this monster …
Surely an allusion to Mary Shelley’s most famous novel.
Howsomeverotherwise, the “monster” created by Dr. Frankenstein in that story started out open-hearted, curious and friendly. Has anyone ever applied any of those adjectives to Mrs. DeSantis’s little boy?
I would say both are broken. The primary system isn’t fair. The people who do well in the early states quickly dominate even if they are not popular nationally. Plus various secondary problems caused by the order of states, the order traditionally being constant, rules for primaries being very different across states and other smaller weirdness.
When your enemy is in the middle of making a mistake, don’t interrupt, etc. etc.
AFAICT, DeSantis’s main campaign issue is that he picked a fight with a cartoon mouse and is so far losing.
I’m on the opposite coast from Florida but still, I can’t see that killing Mickey Mouse off is going to do anything to improve my life.
I also can’t summon the energy to hate a cartoon mouse that isn’t even real, not that I don’t sort of like Mickey Mouse anyway.
His Orwellian project to rewrite history didn’t impress me either.
If I wanted to live in Orwell’s world, I would move to Oceania.
raven @ # 6: … he picked a fight with a cartoon mouse and is so far losing. … His Orwellian project to rewrite history …
You left out some salient data, such as DS’s hijacking of health departments, local governments, and education at every level. DeathSentence continues to pull every lever of power within his reach; fortunately he often fumbles them, but his apparent randomness also illustrates his untiring efforts to TAKE CONTROL using whatever his governorship/candidacy brings to hand.
Pray to the gods of LDL-cholesterol not to let the painted capo fall too soon!
“Someone has to hang a bell on the cat”. A perfect combination of arrogance and cowardice, bloviating that something must be done but lacking the courage to say precisely what. I can guess why -- he’ll have his opinion, probably, but he’s terrified that if he actually states what it is, everyone will look at him pityingly and go “ah yeah nah”, and ignore him. He’s petrified of backing the wrong horse. What a pathetic wimp. And what a lovely job Trump has done of bringing him and the Republicans to this state of affairs.
That’s a fascinating choice of words, isn’t it? There’s an election coming, and Republicans are working hard to defeat… Biden? No. ANY Democrat? No.
Penry, the mild mannered janitor?Donald Trump, who delivered their last Presidential election victory, and in the subsequent election increased the number of votes he got by over ELEVEN MILLION, the second highest popular vote in US election history, and currently still comfortably the most popular Republican? Could be!The one, the only thing I’ve always admired about the Right, the thing the Left should learn from them, is their historic tendency to unity -- the ability, when out of power or approaching an election, to put aside their squabbles and do the only thing that matters -- GET or RETAIN POWER. Watching the Republicans tearing themselves apart over this is very gratifying, if a bit baffling. You’d think, by now, that they’d got the memo that the country at large doesn’t give two shits about Trump’s legal woes -- he’s their man, not any of the shower of no-marks trailing in his wake. It’s lovely watching, again, as the people who think they’re in charge are handed their asses by the intransigent, uncooperative voting public. Ain’t democracy great?
Depends somewhat on the nature of the mistake… When they’re making a mistake that could also have serious consequences for you, you may want to reconsider that principle. How do you feel about the prospect of a second Trump presidency? How much further damage would his candidacy do to the already badly-damaged institutions of American politics, even if unsuccessful?
My guess: he’s actually thinking they should all agree to withdraw in favour of the obvious unity candidate: Mitt Romney!
Ideal would be a catastrophic but non-fatal stroke a few months before the convention, leaving him speechless, immobile, and with one side of his face fallen. There would still be many in the party wanting to make him the nominee despite his obvious incapacity, while all the pretenders would be biting chunks out of each other in the scramble to replace him. But DeSantis would be much less likely to defeat Biden than a “healthy” Trump -- the latter’s political skills are constantly under-estimated (look at how he still dominates the Republican Party, despite serial failures), while DeSantis is as charismatic as a mound of dogshit.
KG @ # 11: Ideal would be a catastrophic but non-fatal stroke a few months before the convention…
“Ideal” … might better happen soon after the con, so without any mechanism in place for plugging in a replacement -- with Cheetolini still (barely) capable of insisting on his own continuance to create maximum intra-Repub friction. (Don’t misunderestimate DeSpicable -- what he lacks in charisma, he more than compensates for with skulduggery.)
And cake and ponies for everybody!
@8 sonofrojblake:
You answered your own question indirectly. The Republicans want power for Republicans to implement Republican policy. Trump wants power for Trump, he has no sensible policy, can’t be trusted to keep any bargain, and can’t be controlled. He can be nudged in certain directions by playing on his ego but the circle of people playing on his ego is big. It contains a lot of people outside the Republican party and in fact contains a lot of non-Americans. His ideas are often petty, can’t work and he isn’t concerned if they are legal or not.
I am.sitting back with a bag of popcorn and enjoying the show. This is beautiful. The only thing that would top this is a bona fide republican Thunderdome (rest in peace, Tina Turner).