Political Mistakes: What Is the Future of Donald Trump and the Republican Party After the Red Wave Setback?

The results of the US midterm elections, several days after they were held, have dispelled fears that former US President Donald Trump and his Election Deniers movement would control the House of Representatives, the Senate, and state governments and parliaments.

The Democratic Party succeeded in maintaining its limited majority in the Senate, while the Republican Party succeeded in achieving a limited majority in the House of Representatives, which disappointed Trump’s expectations that the midterm elections would witness a red wave, and largely settled the political battle between the two parties.

The decline in Trump’s chances in the upcoming presidential elections and the escalation of the chances of his main rival, Ron DeSantis, is the most important development resulting from the midterm elections that took place on November 8, 2022, which puts Trump’s political future on the line.

The midterm elections mark the end of the Trump era, as writer Allister Heath emphasized in his article in The Telegraph entitled Trump is finished. The future of the Republican Party belongs to DeSantis, adding that “the party must now face up to the reality that Trump poses an existential threat to its conservative vision for America.”

 

Republicans Split

Splits hit the US Republican Party with the disappointing midterm elections after achieving smaller-than-expected gains in the House of Representatives, and seeing the Democrats winning control of the Senate.

The New York Post, owned by Rupert Murdoch, who is considered one of Trump’s biggest advocates and supporters since his candidacy in 2016 and during his tenure, published an editorial on November 9, 2022, attacking Trump under the title Toxic Trump.

The article stated: “What the election results suggest is that Trump may be the biggest voter-carrier in modern American history. Except for states in which Republicans were doomed to win, supporting Trump meant failure.”

The simple majority that the Republican Party won in the elections revealed the existence of a split within the Republican Party, i.e., between the conservative Republican and the Trumpian Republican, which confused its rules and led many swingers to side with the Democrats.

According to The Washington Post in its report on November 13, 2022, Republicans are facing an existential quandary over who will lead the party after former President Donald Trump, before his expected announcement this week about his candidacy for the presidential elections in 2024.

The disappointing results of the midterm elections, along with Trump’s loss in 2020 to incumbent Joe Biden, have led to an increase in public and private talk among Republicans about thinking about a post-Trump world, according to the American newspaper.

Many of the party’s major donors are trying to sideline Trump, support other candidates, and usher in a new generation of party leaders, considering that Trump’s political slogans, which they described as toxic, are the reason for the failure in three consecutive elections.

On its part, The New York Times reported in a report on November 9, 2022, that Trump is facing an attack from across the Republican party, after a series of losses for the candidates he chose and supported, which is an indication of the weakness of his victory in the upcoming elections or his candidacy in the first place.

The Democrats’ control of the US Senate also sparked mutual accusations within the Republican Party, with Trump critics blaming him for the weak performance of Republican candidates.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell blamed Trump for putting the party in such a weak position, while Trump met with a stinging attack on him.

Trump’s response was to dwell on baseless allegations about election fraud and wrote on his social networking platform (Truth Social) that the results were a deception, blaming McConnell for what happened and noting that the Kentucky senator misspent campaign money.

It is noteworthy that Mitch McConnell had attacked several months ago Trump’s choices of a number of candidates and their support in the party primaries, especially the Senate seats.

As Scott Reed, a veteran Republican strategist, noted that “after Americans were dissatisfied with inflation and President Joe Biden’s policies, the Republican Party had a historic opportunity, but Trump’s selection of unqualified candidates missed that opportunity.”

Trump has sought to use the midterm elections as an opportunity to establish his lasting political influence after losing the White House in 2020, an Associated Press report said on November 10, 2022.

Trump has backed more than 330 Republican candidates in the party primaries over the past months, often helping to create candidates who lack the experience and ability to defeat critically flawed Democratic rivals, and celebrate their primaries victories.

Among those candidates that Trump endorsed in the Senate are Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania, and Don Bolduc in New Hampshire, states that Republicans could easily have won if they had traditional candidates, as well as Blake Masters in Arizona, in addition to Doug Mastriano, the candidate for governor of Pennsylvania, and Tudor Dixon of Michigan.

 

Trump Influence

The Republicans’ modest results have raised new questions about Trump’s appeal, and the future of the party he has embraced so well, which seem to be in jeopardy, while giving new impetus to his strongest potential rivals in the Republican Party, says the Associated Press.

Which prompted former Trump White House adviser Jason Miller to appear on the right-wing television network Newsmax and say, “I would advise him to postpone announcing his candidacy until after the run-off in Georgia,” adding: “Georgia needs to be the hub of every Republican in the country at the time.”

It is noteworthy that since his loss to Biden in 2020, Trump has continued to consolidate his control over the Republican Party, as he succeeded in overthrowing his opponents within the party, led by Liz Cheney, the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, which reflects the decline of the traditional Republican trend and the change of the Republican Party’s compass towards the extreme right.

Following the announcement of the results, Sarah Matthews, a former Trump aide, tweeted: “The midterm results were the biggest indicator that Donald Trump should not be the Republican nominee in 2024. He cost the party winnable seats by boosting poor quality candidates.”

After the Senate results were decided in favor of the Democrats, Republican Senator for Missouri Josh Hawley called on his party to build something new, tweeting: “The old party is dead. Time to bury it.”

On November 15, Trump officially announced his candidacy for the 2024 presidential election, an announcement he had planned before the midterm elections in order to be a continuation of the red wave he expected, which disappointed him but did not discourage him from backing down.

Although prominent Republican voices suggest it is time to move away from Trump’s approach to leadership that is based on hard-right ideas and conspiracy theories, the former president still enjoys significant popular support, and his competition for the Republican presidential nomination is extremely risky.

In turn, outgoing Republican Governor of Maryland Larry Hogan told CNN on November 13, 2022, that the party should change direction and move forward, saying: “It is the third election in a row that we lost because of Donald Trump, and after three setbacks he must come out.”

Dr. Radwan Ziadeh, senior fellow at the Arab Center Washington DC (ACW), said in a statement to Al-Estiklal that Trump’s chances of success in the upcoming presidential elections, for which he announced his candidacy, are very weak, pointing out that this is the third time that Trump has lost at the national level.

Regarding the Republicans’ failure to achieve the results they expected in the midterm elections, Dr. Ziadeh explained that “the Supreme Court’s decision to ban abortion in America at the request of the Republicans was a major reason for their party’s failure in the elections.”

He pointed out that “the Supreme Court’s decision activated the democratic base and incited it to vote massively in favor of the Democratic Party, which played a pivotal role in keeping the Democrats in control of the Senate.”

The researcher also noted that “Trump has recently entered into a conflict with the governor of Florida, because of his narcissistic personality that is based on destroying the personality of every competitor, even though Ron DeSantis has not yet announced his candidacy for the presidency.”

 

Potential Clash

In the same context, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis scored a landslide victory in the midterm elections in Florida, which is considered one of the swing states, as he was re-elected by a large margin of more than 1.5 million votes. This raised more speculations that he might run for the Republican Party in the upcoming presidential elections of 2024, to run in a possible competition against former President Donald Trump to win the party’s ticket for the presidency, as reported by the American website The Hill on November 10, 2022.

Many Republicans consider DeSantis to be a shining star in the party sky, and some are counting on him to oust the former president from the potential candidacy race.

Although DeSantis also belongs to the populist right within the Republican Party, he is seen as a more rational and stable figure than Trump, more able to mobilize the support of the various blocs within the Republican Party, and more able to cooperate with the Democratic Party to achieve the national interest.

It is widely believed that both Trump and DeSantis desire the Republican nomination, which means a potential clash between the two given Trump’s recent proactive moves against DeSantis.

Trump had warned Florida’s governor against running for president in 2024, saying it would hurt the Republican Party. He told Fox News: “I think he would make a mistake. I think the party’s fan base wouldn’t like that.”

Trump also threatened to release private information about DeSantis without providing any details, saying: “I know more about him than anyone, perhaps other than his wife,” which in general means the increased possibilities of more verbal exchange between them in the near future.

It is noteworthy that one of the reasons Trump is worried about DeSantis is that the latter has strong influence at home in the United States by virtue of his current position, which allows him to influence the foreign policy of the United States, and makes him one of the most prominent figures within the Republican Party in the current period.

DeSantis plays a pivotal role in directing US trade abroad, similar to his issuance last September of an executive order to limit the federal and local government’s trade with companies linked to seven countries, led by China and Russia.

DeSantis also challenges federal authorities on migration, such as his recent signing of legislation banning so-called safe cities, which generally help protect undocumented migrants from deportation by restricting cooperation between local law enforcement and federal migration authorities.

DeSantis prefers to relax Florida’s gun laws in a way that negatively affects the security of neighboring countries, according to some recent reports.

Cas Mudde, Professor at the University of Georgia, said, “Trump opened the door to revolution in the Republican Party, which allowed people like DeSantis to rise. Now the governor of Florida and his supporters want to continue that revolution without its original leader, Trump.”

“Not all aspirants to lead the Republican Party differ ideologically from Trump, but they have a different political experience, and they have more accurate visions than Trump’s spontaneity and populism,” he continued.

He added, “DeSantis, for example, adopts Trump policies on issues of immigration, abortion, unlimited support for Israel, and anti-China.”

On his part, Princeton University professor Sean Wilentz acknowledged that getting rid of Trump would not be so simple, saying: “His leadership appears to be the Republican electoral base as strong as ever.”

He added, “Once Trump announces his candidacy again and his rallies will become his official campaign headquarters, it may be too late to stop him. What makes matters worse is that Trump has a tyrannical charisma, but DeSantis doesn’t yet have these qualities despite his quality.”