Maybe it’s time for a fluff piece discussing a far-off election. I say fluff because there is no insider or reliable way for anyone to tell what’s going to happen in 2024. I’ve watched headline after headline for the past six months or more wherein someone declares they know if Trump will run for President. So far, no word and everyone that predicted a declaration has so far been wrong. They are the insiders. So speculate we will and it’s all anyone can do.
Here are the facts on the ground. Polling unanimously predicts a Democrat bloodbath in 2022 and Republicans will likely control both houses of Congress. Trump is actively endorsing his chosen candidates. So far, many of his picks have won. Polling also suggests that Trump is far more appealing to a margin of voters. It’s what I’d consider a moderate lead; not slim, not overwhelming. If an election were held today, Trump would win. He would win simply because many of the scams and artificial loopholes that corrupted the 2020 election are now fixed, made illegal. Of course, he would win because of Biden’s disastrous Presidency. But 2022 is not 2024. It’s not that all these cited conditions will change in two and a half years, it’s that Trump has his own internal measure for running and that measure may change.
Florida Governor DeSantis is the other highly ranked possibility. He’s an extraordinary principled leader without the baggage that Trump brings to everything he does. If DeSantis ran in the absence of Trump, it would be an electoral landslide win of proportions maybe never seen. If Trump runs, DeSantis has signaled he will not. It’s as simple as that. If DeSantis ran, the far left, establishment left and maybe even the establishment Republicans would attempt to make him appear every bit as an incarnation of Trump even though DeSantis is vastly different.
I would gladly take Trump, provided he could better manage the opposition that came against him. I would gladly take DeSantis even more if only because we’d be guaranteed eight years of his profoundly based leadership. I would like to say that Trump has learned something in his exile, that he would not repeat the over-trusting and the appointment of all of his many betrayers that stabbed him in the back. His methodical endorsements for Congress suggests that he’s learned. He has learned unless and until yet another friend stabs him in the back. That is his principal weakness. I don’t like that margin of doubt.
Even now, it’s not guaranteed that Trump will run. He just made an off-hand comment about his health, how it would be a cause to not run if something happened. Is that a clue? While Trump has been poor at judging his friends, he’s been brilliant in judging his enemies and fearless in standing up to them. In that, DeSantis also has excelled. I don’t know if Trump is running. No one knows.