Looking through Ryan Lizza and Daniel Lippman’s piece on Donald Trump’s campaign in Politico, I was struck by how widespread the impression is that the president employed “a bag of tricks” to get elected in 2016. There are a lot of people who seem to believe that Trump’s sagging polls indicate that he’s like a children’s birthday party magician who is now being asked to work a college fraternity.
I suppose there’s something to this comparison. In serious times, some jokes seem frivolous or insensitive. And every performer needs fresh material if they want to avoid boring the audience. But my favorite characterization of Trump’s 2016 success comes “a senior GOP congressional aide.”
“It used to be that he would do five rallies a day and say whatever came off the top of his head and he thinks that won him the election,” said a senior GOP congressional aide, echoing the sentiments of a still-intact class of Republicans appalled by Trump and how he is turning vast swaths of Republican-leaning suburbs into Democratic territory. “It’s like when a 25-year old gets drunk and shows up at a family engagement. That can be cute. But if you’re a 50-year-old and you show up at the gathering drunk and embarrassing, that just hits a little differently. It’s not cute anymore.”
A similar analysis was offered by Trump mega-donor Dan Eberhart:
Trump’s misunderstanding of what got him elected in 2016 is at the heart of the problem, Eberhart argued.
“Trump’s general ability to just feed the base three times over and that will carry you to victory is not really a recipe for success,” he said. “The base is high 30s and that won Trump the primary but he largely won the general election because Hillary was so unpopular. And Biden’s negatives are not as high as Hillary’s so there’s a big problem.”
These explanations attempt to explain why Trump doesn’t pivot or try something different. But it’s probably fair to say he didn’t really try to win the first time. He just discovered that if he got himself on television everyday talking shit about people, he’d soar in Republican polls. He didn’t change anything once he realized it was working. He didn’t change his primary “strategy” for the general election. His victory was a fluke, and he thought it reflected his brilliance.
Setting aside the COVID-19 pandemic and the economy and the fact that Trump was impeached, everything that worked for his 2016 campaign was premised on him being an outsider. He wasn’t a Bush Republican. He wasn’t an incumbent. He hadn’t cast a million votes over decades while middle America was getting hollowed out.
None of that works when you’re the president and the leader of your party. Newt Gingrich sent a dispatch from Rome to gently point out to Trump that he’s running Nixon’s 1968 campaign when he should be modeling his 1972 reelection. That’s absolutely true, except Nixon had a good economy, was winding down the Vietnam War, had opened the door to China, and had a list of domestic accomplishment to tout. Under Trump, Americans aren’t even allowed to travel because we’re too infectious.
It doesn’t really matter. Everything could be going great and Trump’s strategy would be the same. He’d “say whatever came off the top of his head” and expect it to win him the election. It’s not a magic trick. It’s not even a trick at all. He’s just a dude on Twitter who got elected president of the United States once.
It won’t happen a second time.
In 2016 Trump wasn’t just a guy on Twitter. He was a huge TV star with a massive show. People like me and our host didn’t understand this because we wouldn’t have been caught dead watching reality TV, but he was one of the most popular men in America.
That’s about right. Outside the confines of the NYC metro area, where Trump was not exactly beloved, he had managed to fashion himself into something of a legitimate celebrity. I admit to watching part of the first season of the Apprentice to see what the hype was about. Once I realized that none of the tasks the contestants were doing had anything to do with running a business, I’d seen enough. But I do know a lot of people who really did buy into his mythology. He’d been a best-selling author before that. Until it caught up with him, he could fake his way through the image of a self-made successful real estate mogul who could overcome any obstacle. The reality, as we all know now, is considerably more complicated (the simple version – Dad helped him until he couldn’t, and then Trump managed to fail up through life thereafter). This is just my long-winded way of saying that this is not just some dude with a twitter account (I am just some dude with a twitter account), but rather a celebrity with a considerable following prior to 2016 with a twitter account. Makes a huge difference.
Its been stated before by better writers than me, but I really don’t think he wanted to win the last election. Our society was just a lot weaker then any anticipated.
If he can wriggle out of any after presidency legal issues, he’ll love being an ex-President. Tons of media attention. Likely a new show. Tons of financial opportunities. And tons of fans (cultists) who would jump off a bridge for him because hes a “Truth teller” (if you are a regular Republican) or the “chosen Messiah” ( for the Qannon types)
Win or lose, I don’t think he is ever going away.