Trump-DeSantis 2024, or I Will Write In DeSantis

 

When I was still on the Trump train in 2022, I remade an old 2020 campaign sign. I replaced Mike Pence, who should have returned the questionable Electoral results back to the key swing states, with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. I displayed in the sign during a pro-life rally in Santa Monica. Not exactly the most welcoming venue, but I didn’t care. They would have been a dream team. And now, if Trump’s dream of returning to the White House is to have any chance of coming true, he needs to bring in Ron DeSantis.

Let’s not fool ourselves here. Trump barely carried the Iowa caucuses with 51% of the vote. In 1980, incumbent president Jimmy Carter almost captured 60% of the vote, but he had to fight US Senator Ted “Chappaquiddick” Kennedy al the way to the nomination. “The Dream will never die,” bellowed the Boston Brahmin, recognizing that his four years of machinations against Carter and for the presidency had all sunk in the Potomac. Then Carter went on to lose to Governor Ronald Reagan. Of course, Carter was also dealing with another liberal nattional party contender, Republican-turned-Independent Congressman John Anderson of Illinois, who very likely siphoned away enough votes for Reagan to upend the incumbent.

The disaffected third-party candidates make the difference. In 1992, George H. W. Bush got dragged down from his right by Patrick J. Buchanan, who wanted more culture war and a return to lower taxes for working Americans. Independent Ross Perot siphoned votes away, and Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton knocked out the GOP incumbent.

In Election 2024, we are looking at at least three strong or well-known independents and third-party challengers: Robert Kennedy, Cornel West, and Jill Stein. They are all left-leaning, although Kennedy is reaching out to disaffected Republicans and Democrats by stressing the importance of health freedom and civil liberties. Joe Biden is in trouble. If the No Labels Movement brings in Joe Manchin, then Democrats are in really big trouble. Yes, Joe Biden can lose 2024.

However with the ongoing unfavorables weighing down Trump, it’s all too likely that voters will stick with the Devil they know and vote for Joe for four more years. Furthermore, there is nothing to stop the DNC from releasing the delegates from Joe Biden to someone else, i.e. Gavin Newsom, Michelle Obama, who will be even more competitive than Biden, who is mired in favorable percentages in the 30’s. Kamala Harris will get pushed aside for the other black woman whose magical last name will charm the voters, and Democratic woke enthusiasts will be thrilled to vote for TWO black women on the ticket. Oh, the significance of the passage of time!

But back to the Iowa and now the New Hampshire results.

Trump won 51% of Iowa caucus voters, and 54% of New Hampshire voters. Yes, the horrific weather contributed to the lower Iowa turnout, but Governor DeSantis shared with Steve Deace in a post-mortem interview that a number of prior caucus goers were foregoing the exercise this year. They wanted someone else, but they felt that Trump’s ascendancy was inevitable, so they didn’t go. With all of these mitigating factors, Trump still scored 51% of the vote. Only 51%!

That’s 49% that voted for someone else, and the remainer was nearly evenly split between Nikki Haley and DeSantis. I predict that that division is only going to fester for the remainder of the primary season. Yes, NeoCon Nikki, propped up with corporate money and fawning corporate media, will run this campaign as long as she can. Big donors from the military-industrial complex have the money to burn, and Nikki has nothing but time and lobbyist jobs waiting for her once this primary ends.

Trump needs to coalesce a still fractured GOP, and the best way to do that is to bring Governor Ron DeSantis onto the ticket. There’s 20-25% of the Republican electorate—including myself—that is not on board with Trump. If necessary, I am prepared to write in Ron DeSantis, and let the election results land where they may in November. Trump can’t ignore the fact that DeSantis is Trump with results, more polished on the campaign trail, without the baggage, willing to do what is best for the team. He has already endorsed President Trump, and he has lost nothing of his conservative, constitutionalist swagger which made him a Republican rockstar.

Trump needs to heal the divide BEFORE the convention. Incumbent Gerald Ford in 1976 faced a bitterly divided conference all the way to the convention, then pulled off the win on the first ballot. Conservatives were not happy, even though Governor Reagan took the podium, celebrated the RNC platform’s bold colors, and gave a subtle endorsement for the Ford-Dole ticket. Ford still lost. Imagine if Ford had brought Reagan onto the ticket. Maybe then we would have never had to suffer through a Carter presidency!

Trump and his campaign have burned so many bridges. Trump’s influencers have been particularly petty. A wide swath of them don’t want any olive branch extended to the DeSantis people. Even on my little social media feeds, I still get blowback from other Republicans who can’t believe that I would rather settle for four more years of Dementia Joe than Donald Trump. But the acrimony is still there. The lack of trust is palpable. Trump didn’t keep promises during his first term. Whether due to his own incompetence or the insolence of the executive corps around him, he failed. The best way to restore any kind of trust is to bring on a tried-and-true conservative warrior who can also serve as GOP successor.

So, President Trump, the choice is yours. Do you want a chance at winning again? You can’t make it on  your own record. Bring on Governor Ron DeSantis for the VP slot. Then you will have my vote. Otherwise, I am totally at peace writing in the Governor of Florida and resigning myself to four more years of Biden failures.

DeSantis Didn’t Get It, But Will Trump?

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, one of the most able executives in the country, a polished veteran not just of the battlefield but the political field, the Congressman turned Governor who took a losing primary in 2018 into an upset victory, then won another upset victory in the devastating general election of 2018; who governed like a restorer, not just a conservative; a man with a young and growing family, who showed up to lead during times of crisis while rejecting the public health-surveillance state, who accomplished every plank of the GOP platform; who turned Republicans from underdog to running the state of Florida, who flipped blue counties red and ended voter fraud and allegations of misconduct into a non-entity, has suspended his campaign for President.

DeSantis didn’t get it. Not this time.

I knew his campaign was over when he received the drastically underwhelming 21% in the Iowa caucuses earlier last week. We had expected a red tsunami in 2022, and we didn’t see one. We had believed Trump would win re-election in 2020, but that didn’t happen. Like many DeSantis supporters and other disaffected Republicans, I believed that the polling for the last six months was flawed and just plain bad.

Governor Ron DeSantis was the best Republican governor in a generation, if not the current (and even previous) century. Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, my first choice for President in 2016, had defeated Big Labor in their own Birthplace, the once progressive state of Wisconsin. Walker sharpened his stance on illegal immigration, and he notched an incredible array of conservative reforms in his state. He didn’t make it past September 2015 because he underestimated Trump and overextended his resources.

DeSantis was different. He had witnessed two prior campaigns for Trump, and he learned to harness the MAGA message for big wins in the Sunshine State. Throughout his presidential campaign, DeSantis hewed the finest line possible attacking Trump for failing to keep his promises, while hacking away at a corrupt media, an onerous corporate wing of American politics (which wants Woke until we all go broke), and without dishonoring Republican voters (he never called them “deplorables,” and Trump activists attempt to pin him down for the “listless vessels” remark went nowhere).

DeSantis plotted and planned as best he could. He made it to Iowa, and then he plummeted.

What happened? Why couldn’t Governor DeSantis make the cut, cut the deal, and make the grade?

First of all, just as in 2016, Trump the master of marketing and branding, saturated the airwaves and the media’s attention. When he announced his relaunch campaign in 2022, Trump was a middling candidate getting lackluster polling. He already sounded old, tired, out of touch, uninteresting. Most of the major networks didn’t see or care all that much.

But then came the indictments, the lawsuits, all the lawfare against the former President. One charge after another, one banana-republic style persecution after another, and he was the king of the hill once again. There was no way that any candidate could have overcome all the free publicity and massive sympathy from Republican voters, the vast majority of whom still rightly believe that Election 2020 was stolen.

All the strongest, wisest DeSantis surrogates pleaded with the wide swath of Republican primary voters to explain to the rest of us: “How do you expect Trump to overcome the negative headwinds among Independents and disaffected Republicans if—or when—he is convicted of one or more crimes, felonies, etc.?” No answer was provided, because of the 51% (so far) of the Republican voters, Trump is just going to magically ride out and override all this lawfare.

Still, does the DeSantis campaign bear some burden of responsibility for not clinching the nomination, let alone not even getting close?

Call me biased, but I submit that that is not the case. He had the best conservative record of any of the candidates, especially including Donald Trump, who failed to keep a number of promises and has either excused or doubled down on his prior executive mistakes. DeSantis was not charismatic, but he was consistent, competent, and compelling in diction, his company, and his campaigning. His case for replacing Trump, on paper at least, is unassailable.

But politics, especially a modern Republican brand that is driven so heavily by identity politics and emotions, is not open to reason, calculation, or prospective considerations. Too many of the current primary voters simply have nostalgia for the good times of the Trump Administration, when gas was cheaper, costs were lower, nations feared us, and criminals respected us. Of course, all of that was obliterated with Trump’s COVID-19 response, including his relatively disturbing inaction during the George Floyd riots.

Four years later, it seems as though GOP voters did not remember, or rather do not want to remember all the failures, fallouts, and just plain folly of Year 2020. I don’t blame them, but I do have to reproach them for ignoring the incredible work that Governor DeSantis accomplished during that very difficult time.

With the New Hampshire primary approaching, I predict a massive double-digit win for Trump, with a single-digit blowout against DeSantis. He was wise to assess the situation and quit. Nikki Haley will drop out once she craters to 21% in the Granite State against Trump to save herself the embarrassment of losing her home state while running an active campaign.

Call my cynical, but I don’t have high hopes for a Trump return to the White House in 2025. Democrats can coalesce all their delegates for the Chicago convention, then Biden can release them to Gavin Newsom or Michelle Obama. What’s Trump going to do then? And even if Trump pulls of another upset win, can we expect anything less than another four years of middling performances and broken promises?

Governor Ron DeSantis didn’t get the nomination. Will Trump get the fact that he hurt himself in 2020 and learn from those mistakes in 2024? The jury is still out on that one.