Those looking into the Magic 8-Ball of the 2018 midterms recognize that it’s looking pretty bleak for the GOP. “Slaughtered” might be a better term to describe how Republicans might fare in November, according to longtime GOP strategist Ali Alexander.
“The inverse of 2010 [midterm elections] is not gonna happen, but the blue bump is coming,” Alexander said about the impending Democratic blue wave in an interview with the Washington Examiner. “Because the power structure now, we would lose the House if there was an election today.”
Instead of sitting on his hands, Alexander founded the American Priority Conference, which will hold its first annual gathering in Washington at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel from September 6 to 8 —only two months before the 2018 midterm elections. This new conference, according to a press release, will be a venue for “conservatives, center-right populists, economic nationalists, and libertarians to discuss their ideas and prioritize agenda items within the political, policy, and cultural arenas.”
Some of those individuals whom Alexander is interested in having speak at the American Priority Conference were left out of the Conservative Political Action Conference earlier this year, including members of the House Freedom Caucus, conservative commentator Ann Coulter, GOP political strategist Roger Stone, and pro-Trump media figure and provacateur-turned-journalist Mike Cernovich.
“It’s not really disputable that Mike Cernovich broke some of the biggest stories last year — from Susan Rice unmasking to recently teaming up with BuzzFeed over John Conyers,” Alexander said.
He continued. “Regardless of what anyone thinks of where Mike came from — Gamergate type of influence — before he became political, I think that he deserves questioning on things. I’m not necessarily saying he deserves a keynote, although I do think he does, but why don’t we have conservative journalists saying, ‘What can we learn from him?’ or, ‘What influences can we rub off on him?’ so that our ideology is one that’s growing and not shrinking.”
According to Alexander, he was inspired to launch this new conference because of the “total dismissal of the message of Andrew Breitbart.”
“I see a movement ready to die,” he said. “And I’m a part of that movement.”
Alexander told the Washington Examiner he specifically planned the timing of the conference to reinvigorate Republicans and conservatives to show up to the polls to vote to save the House and Senate before the 2018 midterm elections, as CPAC happens around February and March every year.
“I wanted to make a conscious effort to not recruit everyone to Washington during the winter to freeze their butts off and forget what they learned, but instead close the gap,” Alexander explained. “We know the science says that only three times in American history has a party with the majority as big as ours is now expanded their majority. We’re certainly not going to expand ours. There’s no doubt about it, but we could do a lot less losing.”
Alexander continued to say that the 18th Congressional District election in Pennsylvania last week and the Alabama Senate race proved that there’s an enthusiasm gap between Democrats and Republicans. It’s not the result of Republican Party infighting. Additionally, Alexander said he was also inspired to create this gathering because of the individuals who were iced out of CPAC resulting in lower attendance, fewer sponsors, and the number of related conservative media and influencer parties diminishing.
“I even had a former ACU [American Conservative Union] board member walk up to me in the hallways [at CPAC 2018], saying, ‘Ali, we’re dead,'” Alexander added. “I think moving it over to the Gaylord [hotel at the National Harbor] was a bad decision. I think excluding grassroots conservatives is a bad decision. My motivation is to give people representation.”
CPAC, held earlier this year, drew in big-name speakers like President Trump, Vice President Mike Pence, and a slew of other officials within the Trump administration to help grow the base of the GOP. Alexander admitted that CPAC did do a good job of bringing in more administration officials this year, however, “The base that got Trump elected and those leaders — which I was not a part of — they have zero representation.”
In addition to giving representation to factions of Trump’s base that have been left out, Alexander hopes to have Trump speak as well.
“The administration will have a presence there, and I hope the president will be able to join us.”
