By Kanishka Singh
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu said on Sunday he is considering running for U.S. president in 2024, adding that he believes Donald Trump would lose to Democratic President Joe Biden if the former president secures his party's nomination.
Sununu, who has served as governor of the small New England state since 2017, underscored the need for new leadership.
Asked during an appearance on the ABC News program "This Week" whether he is considering seeking the presidency, Sununu said, "I'm definitely thinking about it, and having those conversations. But at the end of the day, you're going to have a lot of Republicans that get in that race. They're all really good people. They're really good candidates."
He cited former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and current Florida Governor Ron DeSantis as among those he believes will compete for the 2024 Republican nomination. Trump, the only announced candidate, launched his bid in November. Haley is expected to kick off her campaign this month.
Sununu forecast that Trump would lose again to Biden if they have a rematch of the 2020 election.
"Unfortunately, at the end of the day - November of 2020 showed us that, right? - Trump is going to be seen as a very extreme candidate. The country is going to push back against it," Sununu said.
Sununu has some familiarity with the White House. His father John Sununu, himself a former New Hampshire governor, served as White House chief of staff under Republican President George H. W. Bush from 1989 to 1991.
Describing his political philosophy, Chris Sununu told ABC: "I'm kind of that 'live free or die' individual liberty. I believe government has to get out of your way. And we've done it really, really well here in New Hampshire."
The Democratic National Committee on Saturday approved Biden's proposed shakeup of his party's 2024 primary calendar, ending New Hampshire's run as the party's first state-level nominating primary and giving that role to South Carolina.
The move faced opposition from leaders in New Hampshire and Iowa, which traditionally kicked off the state-by-state contest for the party presidential nominations with its caucus.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Will Dunham)
Nikki Haley "embodies" the collapse of the modern Republican Party post-Trump, said former Mitt Romney presidential chief strategist Stuart Stevens to Business Insider, according to an article released on Sunday.
"Mitt Romney's former aide blasted Nikki Haley in a recent interview over the former South Carolina governor's decision to enter the 2024 GOP presidential primary, saying she 'doesn't have anything else to do' and arguing that she is actually seeking a vice presidential slot," reported John L. Dorman. "Stuart Stevens — who was Romney's chief strategist for his 2012 White House run and also a senior advisor for the anti-Trump group the Lincoln Project — questioned Haley's motivation for running for the presidency during a February 2 interview on MSNBC."
"Why is Nikki Haley running? I don't think she's really running because she thinks she's going to be president of the United States," said Stevens. "First of all, she doesn't have anything else to do. She's raised some money here in her PAC and she'll run. And I would say she's running to be vice president. I don't think she's going to go out there and attack Donald Trump."
"No one else really embodies sort of the collapse of the party as well as Nikki Haley," Stevens continued. "She was what the party was supposed to be. She went out and said that Donald Trump was everything that she taught her children not to be, and she went from that to saying that she wants to carry on the Trump legacy. It's just so sad. She's already broken before she gets in the race."
Two years ago, Haley told reporters she would not run against Trump if he ran for president again. Last month, however, she reversed this in an interview on Fox News, saying she believes she can be part of a new generation of leaders in contrast to the more elderly Trump and President Joe Biden.
READ: Conservatives ridicule Marjorie Taylor Greene for urging 'average Joe' to shoot down balloon
Haley is reportedly expected to launch her campaign for president formally later this month — which would make her the only major Republican presidential candidate to do so other than Trump himself, who is busy trying to reboot a campaign launch that was panned by experts as phoned in.
Former U.N. Ambassador and South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley signaled her interest in running for president in an interview this week, and will reportedly formally launch her campaign later this month. The move immediately invited scorn from former President Donald Trump, the only major Republican candidate to have officially declared for 2024 so far.
But it also was a clear reversal for Haley, who — noted CNN's Abby Phillip on Sunday's "Inside Politics" — previously said she would support Trump if he ran for president again.
"This was Nikki Haley nearly two years ago on the possibility of running against Donald Trump for president," said Phillip, playing a CNN clip. "If he runs again in 2024, will you support him?" asked a reporter. "Yes. I would not run if President Trump ran," she replied.
"And this was Nikki Haley just two weeks ago on the possibility of running against Donald Trump for president," said Phillip, showing a clip of a Fox News interview. "Yes, we need to go in a new direction," said Haley. "Can I be that leader? Yes. I think it's time for new generational change. I don't think you need to be 80 years old to go be a leader in D.C."
"How things have changed," said Phillip. "In just over a week, the former Trump administration ambassador to the United Nations is expected to announce that she'll battle her former boss for the Republican nomination. She'll be the first but definitely not the last to mount the challenge to Trump. Let's just say he isn't too happy about it."
Phillip then played a clip of Trump reacting to the news.
"She said numerous times, I put it up actually, that I would never run if our president run, he was a great president, et cetera, et cetera," said Trump. "She said that numerous times. She's a very ambitious person. She just couldn't stay in her seat. I said, you know what, if you want to run, go ahead and run. Nikki suffers from something that's a very tough thing to suffer from. She's overly ambitious."
"No surprises there," said Phillip. "Trump starts with — the very first thing he starts with, I guess, a kind of gender trope about the overly ambitious woman. You better believe that Nikki Haley, who is pretty used to running against a lot of men, that's something that she's going to exploit."
READ: Trump's wall is 'morphing'
Watch the segment below or at this link.
Abby Phillip on Nikki Haley www.youtube.com
Well-known Republicans who clearly don’t want Trump as the nominee include House Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, former U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr and Fox News’ Rupert Murdoch. Author/firebrand pundit Ann Coulter, a former Trump supporter, is making no secret of the fact that she believes DeSantis would be a much stronger nominee. However, The Lincoln Project’s Rick Wilson, a Never Trumper and former GOP strategist, believes that Trump would crush DeSantis in a primary and that in the end, the GOP will “bend the knee” to Trump and give him the 2024 nomination.
In an op-ed published by the Washington Post on February 2, data analyst David Byler argues that Trump’s Republican opponents are making a major mistake where the former president is concerned: They are acting like it’s 2016 all over again.
“It’s often said that military leaders ‘fight the last war,’” Byler explains. “They assume their current enemy is just like the previous one, so they misjudge their foe and lose. The Republican establishment is making that exact mistake in the 2024 presidential primary.”
The data analyst continues, “According to multiple recent reports, high-ranking Republicans don’t want Donald Trump to be their 2024 nominee. But they’re afraid he’ll win by recycling his 2016 strategy — carve out a populist base, keep the anti-Trump majority divided between multiple opponents, and emerge as the winner. These GOP leaders don’t realize that Trump has changed over the past eight years — and so have his opponents. They’re wading into a completely new race, yet they’re still preparing themselves for 2016.”
The “Republican establishment,” according to Byler, doesn't realize that Trump is running a much different campaign than he was during the 2016 election.
“He hasn’t held a big arena rally yet, and he’s not dominating the cable airwaves like he did at the peak of the 2016 primary,” Byler observes. “Instead, he’s hosting small events in early primary states and courting the state and local establishments — just like a more typical frontrunner would…. And he’s no longer a highly divisive figure within the GOP…. Put simply, Trump is no longer an outsider who needs to throw elbows, rely on a thin plurality or hope his opposition stays divided. He’s a former president — the ultimate party insider — with a path to an outright majority.
According to Byler, while Trump is a “stronger candidate” than he was in 2016, he also faces “tougher competition” in terms of ideology.
“Trump is no longer ideologically unique within the GOP,” Byler notes. “Potential competitors, such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former Vice President Mike Pence, match Trump’s hardline position on immigration and share his enthusiasm for the culture wars. Trump will have to defend himself as other conservative populists try to eat into his base. And, at this early phase, Trump-skeptical voters are more willing to unite than they were in 2016…. At least at this early point, GOP voters aren’t processing this election the same way.”
Byler adds, “Until top Republicans can see that, they’ll keep expecting 2016 to repeat itself — unable to see that they might be heading into a new kind of war.”
READ MORE: 'He is so done': Ann Coulter doubles down on Republicans to abandon Donald Trump
Read David Byler’s full op-ed at this link (subscription required).
So far, the field of 2024 Republican presidential candidates is quite small. Former President Donald Trump is definitely running, and Nikki Haley (former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and ex-governor of South Carolina) is expected to formally announce a presidential run on February 15. But other Republicans who are being mentioned as possible 2024 contenders — including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo — haven’t yet said whether or not they’re running.
Well-known Republicans who clearly don’t want Trump as the nominee include House Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, former U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr and Fox News’ Rupert Murdoch. Author/firebrand pundit Ann Coulter, a former Trump supporter, is making no secret of the fact that she believes DeSantis would be a much stronger nominee. However, The Lincoln Project’s Rick Wilson, a Never Trumper and former GOP strategist, believes that Trump would crush DeSantis in a primary and that in the end, the GOP will “bend the knee” to Trump and give him the 2024 nomination.
In an op-ed published by the Washington Post on February 2, data analyst David Byler argues that Trump’s Republican opponents are making a major mistake where the former president is concerned: They are acting like it’s 2016 all over again.
“It’s often said that military leaders ‘fight the last war,’” Byler explains. “They assume their current enemy is just like the previous one, so they misjudge their foe and lose. The Republican establishment is making that exact mistake in the 2024 presidential primary.”
The data analyst continues, “According to multiple recent reports, high-ranking Republicans don’t want Donald Trump to be their 2024 nominee. But they’re afraid he’ll win by recycling his 2016 strategy — carve out a populist base, keep the anti-Trump majority divided between multiple opponents, and emerge as the winner. These GOP leaders don’t realize that Trump has changed over the past eight years — and so have his opponents. They’re wading into a completely new race, yet they’re still preparing themselves for 2016.”
The “Republican establishment,” according to Byler, doesn't realize that Trump is running a much different campaign than he was during the 2016 election.
“He hasn’t held a big arena rally yet, and he’s not dominating the cable airwaves like he did at the peak of the 2016 primary,” Byler observes. “Instead, he’s hosting small events in early primary states and courting the state and local establishments — just like a more typical frontrunner would…. And he’s no longer a highly divisive figure within the GOP…. Put simply, Trump is no longer an outsider who needs to throw elbows, rely on a thin plurality or hope his opposition stays divided. He’s a former president — the ultimate party insider — with a path to an outright majority.”
According to Byler, while Trump is a “stronger candidate” than he was in 2016, he also faces “tougher competition” in terms of ideology.
“Trump is no longer ideologically unique within the GOP,” Byler notes. “Potential competitors, such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former Vice President Mike Pence, match Trump’s hardline position on immigration and share his enthusiasm for the culture wars. Trump will have to defend himself as other conservative populists try to eat into his base. And, at this early phase, Trump-skeptical voters are more willing to unite than they were in 2016…. At least at this early point, GOP voters aren’t processing this election the same way.”
Byler adds, “Until top Republicans can see that, they’ll keep expecting 2016 to repeat itself — unable to see that they might be heading into a new kind of war.”
Republican strategist Karl Rove says that, despite Donald Trump currently being the favorite to win the nomination, Republicans must move past him if they want to take the presidency in 2024.
In an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal Thursday he said, "His rambling, hour-long mid-November announcement was widely panned. There have been few endorsements and no trademark rallies. He’s trailing Gov. Ron DeSantis in Florida and New Hampshire polls and is having fundraising difficulties. All this leaves an impression of—dare we say—low energy," Rove writes.
Many of Trump's strengths are still intact, like his huge and dedicated following. But, according to Rove, there's a downside to his strengths. "He’s well-known, sure, but also overexposed. His shtick is old, his speeches boring. More and more Republicans want to turn the page: Only 31% in the Dec. 11 USA Today/Suffolk University poll wanted him to run again."
Rove goes on to write that in 2016, Trump looked strong when he was attacking his opponents because he was the outsider going up against seasoned politicians. But now as a former president, when he attacks his opponents, he looks like he's "punching down."
"It was a mistake to launch assaults against two prospective opponents, Mr. DeSantis and former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley," Rove writes. "Objects of his scorn should ignore the gibes unless they see a great opportunity for political jiu jitsu. Mr. DeSantis pulled off a particularly effective take down when Mr. Trump attacked his Covid record, saying Floridians must approve of it since they re-elected him by a massive 19 points. The subtext: Donald Trump is a loser."
Ultimately, if Republicans want to win in 2024, "they must find a way around him."
Read the full op-ed over at the Wall Street Journal.
The 2024 Republican presidential field is coming together more slowly than expected after Donald Trump became the first to jump into the race.
So far the only serious would-be challengers seem to be Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, Mike Pence and Mike Pompeo -- although none of them have officially announced -- but Republican insiders are surprised by how many potential candidates remain on the fence or are planning to sit out of the 2024 primary race, reported Politico.
“I would’ve told you last fall that there would be five senators in the race,” said GOP strategist Ward Baker, who says he put together a presentation projecting at least 10 candidates in the race.
Trump won the 2016 nomination thanks in part to a large and splintered primary field, and GOP strategists expected the same dynamic could play out in this race, but Baker and other insiders believe only seven or eight serious candidates -- or even smaller -- could remain when Republicans first head to the polls a year from now.
READ MORE: Georgia Republicans sick of 'delusional' Trump
“They don’t have a Trump problem, they have a DeSantis problem,” said GOP strategist Scott Jennings. “It’s going to be hard fighting for the other 60 to 70 percent of the vote [not going to Trump] when another guy could get 90 percent of it.”
DeSantis is already polling strongly against the former president, who seems to recognize his growing popularity with the base, and that two-man dynamic may be freezing out the senators, governors and others who might otherwise throw their hats into the ring.
“Do you want a Trump or DeSantis, or do you want a Mitt Romney or a Liz Cheney?” said far-right Mississippi state Sen. Chris McDaniel, as he announced his campaign for lieutenant governor last week by tying himself to the party's standard bearers.
That seems to be keeping a whole generation of contenders -- Rick Scott, Tom Cotton, Josh Hawley, Glenn Youngkin, Brian Kemp and Larry Hogan -- on the sidelines, because challenging the two figures most popular with the GOP base could hurt them in their re-election campaigns if they didn't win the presidential nomination.
“There’s a sensitivity to his base in the sense that 30 percent of them will be with him and we need everyone at the end of the day,” said RNC member Luis Fortuño, the former Puerto Rico governor.
Donald Trump's would-be 2024 challengers are trying to straddle a line between "crazy" and "rational" as they try to stake out a position before officially entering the race, but MSNBC's Joe Scarborough doesn't think that will win over the Republican base.
The former president is the only major candidate to officially enter the race so far, but Nikki Haley has scheduled an announcement event this month, Mike Pomeo and Mike Pence appear likely to jump in, and Ron DeSantis seems all but certain to run, but the "Morning Joe" host said he's seen this same dynamic play out before.
"This is starting to take on the faint outlines of 2016, where you have Washington Republicans, even if they're trying to be Trumpists, that are being critical of the edges of Donald Trump," Scarborough said. "Yet, you look at polls right now of Republican primary voters -- they are beyond extreme."
"The majority of them are beyond extreme," he added. "The majority of them believe that the election was stolen. The majority of them have crazy views about Trump's own vaccine. The majority of them are far outside the mainstream of American politics, and they're still going to be with Donald Trump. I really -- I think we're getting this divide again that we had in 2016, where the base was all in for Trump, while some Washington Republicans were trying to be a bit rational and tried to straddle that line. There's no straddling it, it seems, still."
READ MORE: Skittish Republicans fear taking on Trump -- and that could hurt him
MSNBC's Jonathan Lemire agreed.
"I suppose it's appropriate that on Groundhog Day, we're getting a rerun of 2016, because that's what it looks like we're going to have," Lemire said. "The difference is, I think the Republican -- Trump knew where the Republican Party was. Instinctively, he knew where the base was in 2016 better than the establishment ever could. That was on issues like immigration and trade and things like that. That's the wall, that's where he struck a chord with them. The party, the base, has only moved with him since. To your point, Joe, it's become more radical, more extreme. It's moved more to the right. That's in line with where Trump took them, so it's going to be hard for a mainstream -- a, quote, mainstream Republican to find some other lane, to find some other place to try to beat him."
"That's why the candidate everyone is looking towards because, like, Pompeo, Pence, Haley -- what is the constituency?" Lemire added. "For now, the flavor of the month is DeSantis. We'll see when he actually gets out there, when he is nationally vetted, where that goes. But what DeSantis is trying to do is take on Trump from the right on a bunch of issues, including on pandemic response and culture wars and the schools in Florida and such. He's making the bet that you have to take on Trump on Trumpism. When we saw others try to out-Trump Trump, they lost and lost badly. Trump, to this point, he's still got the base."
Watch the video below or at this link.
02 02 2023 06 09 33 www.youtube.com
After years talk, potential Republican candidates for the 2024 Presidential nomination are slow to step up to challenge former President Donald Trump.
With the expected Feb. 15 announcement of former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley to challenge Trump, and the eventual expected announcement of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to join the primary season, what was expected to be a crowded field is looking very thin.
The question is why?
Have DeSantis and Trump sucked all the oxygen out of the room?
IN OTHER NEWS: GOP readies 'shameful' vote to oust progressive from House committee
Has Haley already crafted out a niche with women and minorities to cater to the forgotten demographics that may be left behind by DeSantis and Trump?
One moderate candidate that also resides on the I-95 East Coast corridor is former Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, who recently made public his serious thoughts on running for the GOP nomination. Hogan has often stated his proximity to Washington, D.C. as a successful two-term governor in a traditionally blue state as a value proposition on why he would be the GOP candidate that would cast the widest net for potential voters.
"We have to find a candidate that can reach a larger group of people and attract swing voters or we won't be able to govern," Hogan said during a recent interview with Fox News.
The New York Times notes that other theories on the light GOP Presidential candidate field include the less-than-impressive midterm election turnout and a general passiveness and resistance to attack Trump in fear of the long-term repercussions. However, the lack of candidates could be a negative for Trump, as it will not allow him to benefit from a split field as he did in 2016.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced a plan to protect the right to own a gas stove in his state, including a plan to exempt them from sales taxes, reported Fox News on Wednesday — and he made clear that he is staking this as a culture war fight against the Biden administration.
"I think it needs to be done, no tax permanently on gas stoves," he said in his address unveiling his budget proposal. "They want your gas stove, and we're not going to let that happen."
There's just one problem with that: very few Florida homes use gas stoves at all.
In fact, according to the Energy Information Administration, 92 percent of Florida households use electric or induction stoves — the highest percent of any state in America. In general, gas stoves and appliances are more common in states with older housing stock, like California, New York, and Illinois — nationwide, 68 percent of households use some form of electric stove.
IN OTHER NEWS: ‘Homicidal maniac’: Sparks fly as GOP refuses to ban guns in House committee room
Not only that, many homes in Florida do not have natural gas utilities at all; fewer than 5 percent of homes in Florida use natural gas even for primary residential heating, compared to roughly 64 percent of homes in California and 34 percent of homes in Texas.
DeSantis even acknowledged this in his speech, saying he wants the tax exemption even if it won't be of any help to most Floridians because "it's just the principle."
Republican lawmakers and media erupted into a furor after a recent announcement by the Consumer Product Safety Commission that they would be investigating gas stoves, following studies that suggested indoor pollution from burning gas might be linked to childhood asthma, cancer, and a variety of other health problems.
An agency commissioner, Richard Trumka Jr., said of the investigation, "Products that can’t be made safe can be banned," sparking a firestorm of speculation the Biden administration might ban gas stoves altogether.
READ MORE: 'Clearly annoyed' Trump mocks Nikki Haley's honor in cryptic post
CPSC chairman Alexander Hoehn-Saric later clarified an outright ban of gas stoves is not on the table, and that the agency is instead considering "voluntary safety standards" to help manufacturers reduce their risk to consumers.
On Wednesday, Bloomberg reported that another federal agency, the U.S. Energy Department, was considering new regulations for stoves.
Even before this controversy, DeSantis has championed laws favorable to the oil and gas industry over municipalities looking to move away from fossil fuels. In 2021, he signed legislation that bans city governments from restricting the types of energy utilities that operate in them — something several municipalities like Miami had been considering as a climate mitigation measure.
Former President Donald Trump's comments about Nikki Haley on his personal social media platform Wednesday were dripping with sarcasm as he recalled their previous meeting where she asked for his blessing to run for president.
"She called me and said she'd like to consider it, and I said, 'You should do it,'" Trump recounted on Saturday. "I talked to her for a little while. I said, 'Look, you know, go by your heart if you want to run.'"
But on Wednesday afternoon, he posted a video of her previous remarks saying that she would support him if he ran in 2024.
"Nikki has to follow her heart, not her honor. She should definitely run!" he wrote.
IN OTHER NEWS: ‘Homicidal maniac’: Sparks fly as GOP refuses to ban guns in House committee room
So why the seemingly contradictory message about Haley's 2024 bid?
According to NBC News senior national politics reporter Jonathan Allen, Trump is "clearly annoyed she said she wouldn’t and is going to anyway, but it benefits him to have more candidates splitting the non-Trump vote."
Former UN ambassador Nikki Haley on Wednesday previewed a "big announcement" she plans to make in two weeks, widely expected to be the launch of her 2024 US presidential run -- making her the first Republican to throw down the gauntlet to Donald Trump in the race for the White House.
"My family and I have a big announcement to share with you on February 15th! And yes, it's definitely going to be a Great Day in South Carolina!," she tweeted.
Casting herself as a younger, fresher alternative to the former president, Haley has been hinting at a White House bid for weeks, recently posting a video on social media in which she declared: "It's time for a new generation to lead."
The 51-year-old, who served for six years as the governor of South Carolina, is expected to officially announce at an event in Charleston, the Palmetto State's largest town, on February 15.
At this point in the 2020 cycle, 10 Democrats had launched campaigns or exploratory committees, but Trump is so far the only Republican to do so this time around.
Haley, who was Trump's United Nations ambassador for two years, had said she wouldn't run against her former boss.
But her announcement would confirm that Trump will not run uncontested, and Haley is unlikely to be the last Republican to throw their hat in the ring.
Other Republicans seen as potential rivals to Trump include Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Trump's vice president Mike Pence and secretary of state Mike Pompeo, and former Maryland governor Larry Hogan.
"It's exciting to see the leadership that's coming out of South Carolina," said Nancy Mace, a rare anti-Trump House Republican, at a political event in Washington on Wednesday, confirming that she was expecting an invitation to Haley's announcement by the end of the day.
She didn't confirm whether she would be attending, however, telling the crowd at the event organized by congressional media outlet Axios that she was "looking at" possibly endorsing Haley.
Trump said on his way to a rally Saturday in South Carolina's capital, Columbia, that he had spoken to his former envoy on the phone and had encouraged her to run.
The daughter of Indian immigrants, Nimrata "Nikki" Randhawa was raised in Bamberg, South Carolina as a Sikh, but now identifies as Christian. She is married to a South Carolina National Guard officer and has two children.
She rose quickly in the southern state's politics, building a reputation as a plain-spoken conservative in its House of Representatives from 2005 to 2011, when she was elected governor.
She was the face of diversity in a cabinet criticized for being too white, and left the administration in 2018 with a strong global profile -- and a reputation for standing up to her mercurial boss.
But Haley's messaging on Trump has always been inconsistent.
She endorsed senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz during the 2016 Republican presidential primary, calling the brash property baron "everything a governor doesn't want in a president."
Since leaving government, her praise of the Trump presidency has been offset by her criticism of his personal conduct, including his involvement in the 2021 attack on the US Capitol.
Haley averages three percent in 2024 primary opinion polls, according to Morning Consult, trailing far behind Trump at 48 percent, DeSantis at 31 percent, and Pence in single digits.
North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis said at the Axios event elected officials in Washington are "not particularly popular" in a polarized America yearning for change.
"I think President Trump needs to come before the American people, like others that are going to enter in the primary, and build a case," he said.
"People are asking me am I picking somebody at this point. I say, my goodness, it's February of 2023. I want to hear the case."
Former President Donald Trump is able to "screw" his own party with an independent or third-party run should they reject him in 2024, wrote conservative author Jonathan Last for The Bulwark on Wednesday.
Trump is currently the only Republican who has formally declared his candidacy for president, although multiple others like New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu and former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley have expressed interest. Trump mainly appears focused on heading off a challenge from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, attacking him as a "RINO globalist."
"Sarah [Longwell] made a bunch of news this morning with her poll about Always Trumpers. I’m sure you’ve seen it. If not, the most interesting number is that 28 percent of Republican respondents said they’d vote for Trump over either an R or a D if he made a third-party run in 2024," said the report. "Certain members of the Match Throwing Club . . . scoffed at this idea. Ross Douthat explains that, 'Trump is unlikely to run third party and 28 percent of the GOP primary base isn't actually going to vote for a spoiler if it's DeSantis v. Biden.'"
This analysis, said Last, is just "wishcasting" — because Trump doesn't actually need to pull 28 percent of the vote to spoil the election. Just a few points could do it, given how close the last two presidential elections ended up being.
READ MORE: Lead investigator blows the whistle on key finding Jan. 6 committee ignored in final report
It's impossible to know for sure whether Trump would actually run third party if he lost the nomination, wrote Last — however, "I do know that if Trump were to lose the Republican nominating contest, he could bring in a lot of money by running a third-party campaign. And if the question is: 'Trump could make a lot of money by doing X; will he do X?' Well, then the answer is usually: Yes."
Notably, polling doesn't indicate that it's likely Trump will lose the GOP nomination in the first place, with recent Morning Consult numbers suggesting he leads the pack by 17 points.
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