The Thing That Worries Me About Donald Trump in 2020
His rust belt voters may go for one of the Bernie Democrats and if they do, Trump will lose the election
“Trump’s Voter Standing Steady Despite Shutdown” is the headline for a new poll. That sounds about right to me. Despite what the talk show crowd says, Republicans never win shutdown fights. But the last time we lost such a fight, everyone forgot about it thanks to the botched rollout of Obamacare. We still won Congress in that election. Likewise, Trump’s voters are not going to abandon him over the shutdown.
No, the trouble I see for Trump in 2020 is not that Pelosi won this round. Or what the Mueller investigation claims to find. Or whatever fake news the media concocts. As we have repeatedly seen, get-Trump efforts usually blow up on those perpetrating them.
Trump Could Lose (Some) Social Conservatives
To some extent, the same dynamic is at play with Trump and social conservatives. We’re watching to see what he gives us. And if he doesn’t deliver, some will bail on him — especially those in the rust belt, if they feel he’s let them down on the economy too.
The danger to his reelection is less acute because most of us will stay with him, but it’s there. Trump had both chambers of Congress for two years and didn’t pass a single piece of legislation protecting religious liberty.
He did give us almost everything we wanted on judges and that is the most important thing of all. Indeed, it can hardly be overstated. Because once the Democrats are back in power, those judges will be the only thing standing between us and the end of the First Amendment.
Almost everything else we got out of the Trump Administration, it gave us by executive order. Those executive orders will all disappear the moment a Democrat is back in the Oval Office, just as Obama’s did once Trump was in power.
That makes Trump’s first two years a huge missed opportunity. We may not get the same opportunity again even if he’s re-elected.
When Obama was in a similar position, he pushed through Obamacare, the Left’s biggest legislative victory in my lifetime. When Trump was in a similar position, all we got legislatively was a tax cut.
— Peter Wolfgang
The thing that worries me most about Trump is this: Is he delivering the goods for his voters? Do those who voted for Trump believe their lives are better because of it? If yes, he will be re-elected. If no, he will not. I worry the answer to both questions may be “no.”
If Trump Doesn’t Deliver
Trump won an electoral college victory thanks to rust belt states that hadn’t gone Republican for president since the 1980s. He was the first Republican in decades to offer an economic message that appealed to them and not just to the Chamber of Commerce crowd.
But a lot of those states swung back to the Democrats in 2018. I don’t mean to overstate that fact. Midterm and presidential races have different dynamics. Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania could again go for Trump in 2020.
But it is worth noting. Because the GOP only very recently reacquired these voters. Most are natural Democrats who aren’t committed to the Republican candidate. If Trump doesn’t deliver what they expect for him, we will lose them again, and with them the White House and the Senate.
And if we do, it won’t be a victory for the anti-Trump wing of the GOP. They’ll say “Aha, we told you so,” but they have less to offer these voters than Trump does. Establishment Republicans, spare me the talks about how protectionism actually hurts them more and free trade is better and all the other old mainline Republican arguments. I’m not the one you have to convince.
Convince Them
They are. And you can’t convince them because they feel an immediate pain that is not soothed by your economic theories. Tell them that free trade will make America better off in a few years, and they’ll tell you it hurts them now, when they have to mortgage and feed their family and pay the hospital. They’ll tell you they don’t trust you that it will benefit them, rather than hurt them.
They see Trump trying to do something, anything. They see you just giving classroom lectures.
No, they won’t go back to the Romney crowd. They’ll go to Elizabeth Warren. Or someone like her.
Because, like Trump, the Bernie wing of the Democrats wants to do something. Even if it’s a bad thing, even if you can give a million reasons why it won’t work. Even if you can show the Democrats don’t care about rust belt Trump voters but use them as a cover for their lust for power. If Trump doesn’t deliver, that’s where they’re headed. And we will lose in 2020.
Taxes and Jobs
Yes, the tax cut is good. Yes, the economy is good. The question is: Do the guys in the rust belt states who put Trump over the top in 2016 feel it? Are their lives improving? Are the jobs coming back? Do they think their kids’ lives will be better than theirs? Are their life expectancies growing again instead of shrinking? Are fewer of them dying of drug overdoses and suicides?
“This American carnage stops right here and stops right now,” said Trump in his inaugural. Has it? Has it at least slowed down and do they feel things are getting better for them? If not, they’re going to Warren or some other Bernie successor in 2020. The rust belt could swing from Trumpian populism-nationalism to Bernie-like populism-socialism in a heartbeat. Those are the stakes.
