More than 100 days into President Joe Biden’s term, and former President Donald Trump is still everywhere.
From Tuesday evening through Wednesday, Trump issued nine statements through his political action committee, billed each time as the “45th president of the United States of America.” He weighed in on the ratings for Morning Joe (“TANKED!”) and defended his own website traffic from a Washington Post report that his engagement is down. “I have been doing very limited media so the American public could see just how big of a disaster the Biden Administration has been, and I was right,” he said.
Trump has cheered on the election audits in Arizona and New Hampshire, which he says will vindicate his so-far unproven claims to have been cheated out of a second term due to rampant voter fraud. He has promoted poll numbers showing most Republican voters agree with him. Trump has also touted his role in accelerating COVID-19 vaccine development through Operation Warp Speed. “‘One of the greatest miracles of the ages,’ according to many,” he said. “Thank you!”
THE 2024 GOP FIELD IS TRUMP AND EVERYONE ELSE
The news isn’t all good for Trump, however.
A Manhattan prosecutor convened a grand jury in the investigation of Trump’s business. The Senate may be inching toward a bipartisan commission to investigate the events of Jan. 6, when Trump supporters attacked the Capitol to disrupt the certification of Biden’s Electoral College victory.
But Trump is still very much in the headlines since departing the White House. Even Biden is talking about him in what the Atlantic teased as the Democrat’s “first interview after his inauguration.” Biden said he misjudged Trump, whose name appears in the profile nearly a dozen times, telling the magazine, “I underestimated his ability to take the big lie and turn it into something that was salable.”
Many Democrats would like to keep talking about Trump, hoping to run against him in next year’s midterm elections. Leading Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, would prefer to train their fire on Biden, in keeping with how the party regained control of Congress under Democratic Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.
“Any day spent talking about 2020 instead of 2022 is a day wasted,” said a Republican strategist.
But multiple polls show nearly half of Republican voters would vote for Trump to be their presidential nominee in 2024, much less rallying the party next year. A Reuters/Ipsos poll found more than half of GOP voters view Trump as the rightful president of the U.S. right now.
“He’s still the leader of the party,” said a second Republican strategist. “Sorry, Liz Cheney.”
Indeed, Cheney was stripped of her position as the third-ranking Republican in the House as she stepped up her efforts to keep Trump from remaining at the helm of the party in 2024. “The 2020 presidential election was not stolen,” she tweeted, adding that anyone who claims it was is “poisoning our democracy.” The conference had opted to retain her as chairwoman earlier this year after she was one of 10 House Republicans to back Trump’s second impeachment. This time, they replaced her with Rep. Elise Stefanik, a Trump-endorsed New York Republican.
Trump has even reportedly huddled with former House Speaker Newt Gingrich about a Contract with America-like document for Republicans running in next year’s midterm elections. Gingrich claimed the gavel after formulating the original Contract ahead of the 1994 elections, which produced the first GOP House majority since 1955. An updated version would presumably allow Trump to keep his populist imprint on the party going forward. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has said publicly that he welcomes Trump’s involvement in the midterm campaign.
This concerns Republicans who want the party to move on from Trump. Many GOP operatives nevertheless remain convinced that other voices, such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, are doing enough to be heard and remain in a good position to run in 2024 if Trump does not. Other party strategists caution Democrats should be careful what they wish for: They only beat Trump by 43,000 votes in three key battleground states during a pandemic and lost to him in 2016.
Some of Trump’s ubiquity is due to unusual circumstances. He has been a celebrity since the 1980s and is not used to ceding the spotlight. He is weighing another presidential bid, something no one-term president has done since Grover Cleveland. The only recent precedent was former President Gerald Ford considering becoming Ronald Reagan’s running mate in 1980.
Trump’s nomination was the product of grassroots discontent with the party leadership. This makes it difficult for McConnell or McCarthy to fill the void left by Trump’s White House exit. Trump plans to be active in next year’s Republican primaries, intervening against GOP lawmakers who voted to impeach him.
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The GOP’s transformation into a more working-class party as the suburbs drift toward the Democrats has also caught many Republican elected officials flat-footed, complicating the search for Trump’s heir. Some Trump administration alumni, including former Vice President Mike Pence, broke with their boss after the Capitol riot, making it harder for them to succeed him.
Still, it is early and much could change. One Republican consultant wondered if Trump has the discipline or attention span to stay focused on the party out of office, especially with legal problems and business obligations. “It’s a marathon, not a sprint,” the consultant said.
