On Thursday, writing for The Bulwark, longtime GOP strategist and Lincoln Project co-founder Stuart Stevens wrote that "victory is near" for Democrats — and urged them to do everything in their power to make Trump's defeat as total and humiliating as possible.
"Today’s Republicans are not worthy of the great legacy they inherited," wrote Stevens. "When grown men and women refuse to denounce a man who boasts he did not rape a woman because 'she was not my type,' any semblance of public good has been lost. I can’t direct the Republican party to the lost and found where it might reclaim its soul, but I do know that defeat, while not sufficient, is necessary in order for it to embark on that journey."
"In these last two weeks, I would plead with Democrats to change that mindset and banish the timidity," wrote Stevens. "If I ran the Democratic party, here’s what I’d be telling my troops: 'We are going to crush Donald Trump and the sickness he represents. There are more of us than there are of them. We are right. They are wrong. This is our moment. This is our destiny. Walk with confidence. Do not falter. Victory will be ours.'"
Such a mindset is missing from the Democratic Party because they still have nightmares about their surprise loss in 2016, wrote Stevens — but this is the wrong lesson to have learned.
"It wasn’t overconfidence that hurt Hillary Clinton. It was lack of urgency," wrote Stevens. "The inability to imagine Donald Trump has always been one of his great advantages. Republican primary opponents couldn’t imagine that a bankrupt casino owner who talked in public about having sex with his daughter could win the Republican nomination. Many general election voters considered it an impossibility that America would elect Donald Trump and so didn’t bother voting, or voted for third-party candidates in what they thought was a safe protest."
"Do not hesitate to swagger," wrote Stevens. "These last two weeks belong to you. Years from now you will look back on these last days as some of the best in your lives. An evil was unleashed in the country you love and you rose to smite it. You will slay this dragon. Trump is collapsing and his allies of convenience are panicked."
"Now is when you turn a victory into a rout," he concluded. "We are all tired, but the other side isn’t just tired. They are frightened and confused. As they should be. Because they are losing the fight for the soul of this country. And they know it. Victory is near."
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