Conservative commentator Matt Lewis found himself aghast this week by exit polls from the Iowa caucus showing that a full two-thirds of caucus goers falsely believe that the 2020 election was stolen from former President Donald Trump.
Writing in The Daily Beast, Lewis argues that the former president's resounding win in the caucus showed that "Trump's lies are now what defines the party" rather than any policy or belief system.
"This is to say that a majority of Republicans are a) willing to at least pretend to believe something that is patently absurd, and b) focused on relitigating the past," writes Lewis.
In fact, Lewis notes that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis' warnings to conservatives against focusing on the past instead of the future have completely fallen on deaf ears so far because the GOP base can't get over its false belief that the 2020 election was stolen.
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"It didn’t work -- partly because DeSantis cannot deliver a pithy message, but mostly because Republican voters don’t want to reject The Big Lie or focus on the future," he argues. "These voters seem hellbent on renominating Trump."
That said, Lewis argues that such backward-looking messages could be a major turnoff come November, and he sees signs that nominating Trump for a third time would end just as poorly as it did for Republicans in 2020.
"What we are left with is a Republican Party that is hurtling toward nominating Donald Trump," he writes. "And yet, Trump’s dominance simultaneously exposes clues that suggest trouble when it comes to attracting a broader, national electorate."
