2024 US Presidential Elections Megathread

[Syt]

It starts not with a bang, but with a whimper.

[Josephus]

I actually want Trump to win the nomination.  Cause I know he won't win the presidential election

[celedhring]

I actually want Trump to win the nomination.  Cause I know he won't win the presidential election

Those were my thoughts in 2016.

[Valmy]

I actually want Trump to win the nomination.  Cause I know he won't win the presidential election

Too dangerous.

That is a remarkably lame PR spin by Elon. Like he is trying to sell us a lemon used car or something.

[Josquius]

I actually want Trump to win the nomination.  Cause I know he won't win the presidential election

Especially considering the other choice is  essentially "Like Trump only competent"

[Tamas]

I actually want Trump to win the nomination.  Cause I know he won't win the presidential election

Too dangerous.

That is a remarkably lame PR spin by Elon. Like he is trying to sell us a lemon used car or something.

DeSantis seems more dangerous than Trump. He might actually mean the BS he spouts.

[Valmy]

DeSantis seems more dangerous than Trump. He might actually mean the BS he spouts.

I strongly disagree. Nobody would storm the capital for an uncharismatic bore like him.

And the willingness to actually do obviously unpopular stupid things is a good thing in an opposition politician. Trump won't do them, but he will get credit for doing them anyway by his cultish fans. Trump is an existential threat to the Republic, anybody else is not (at the moment anyway).  Trump is not replaceable. When DeSantis goes down, and he will, there will be dozens more Desantises coming up behind him each more uninspiring than the last. So Trump being defeated is vastly preferable.

And DeSantis' popularity rests on his management of the Covid-19 Pandemic in Florida...that is a pretty limited horizon to hang your hat on. Most of the country isn't Florida and Covid-19 isn't exactly the hot political topic anymore.

[Valmy]

Likewise Trump losing the Republican Primary, as unlikely as that is, would be really interesting as it would focus his narcissistic destructive power on the Republican Party instead of the country itself.

The Republicans are a mighty political force but that power depends on their coalition staying strong together. Them choosing DeSantis would fray that power. Remember there are less Republicans than Democrats, they win by being more popular with the Independents and other outsiders. That strength would be severely weakened if they rejected Trump.

But this is all pie-in-the-sky stuff. Trump is going to win and DeSantis is going to get crushed.

[Sheilbh]

I actually want Trump to win the nomination.  Cause I know he won't win the presidential election

Those were my thoughts in 2016.

Yeah I find it slightly mad/alarming to see that opinion out in the wild again after we all saw 2016

[PJL]

Trump tried to overthrow the system from outside. DeSantis is more likely to make the system itself less democratic, much like Orban in Hungary.

[Valmy]

DeSantis is more likely to make the system itself less democratic, much like Orban in Hungary.

I don't buy it. DeSantis gambled and won on Covid-19 and good for him. But his bumbling in Florida and his bumbling handling Trump doesn't make him look dangerous like Orban. His anti-woke and populist messaging as a bland guy in a suit isn't exactly electrifying. I find him hard to take seriously. His recent Elon Musk fail just shows what an amateur hour politician he is.

I will certainly eat my words if I am wrong but in this case I vastly prefer the devil I don't know to the one I do.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I think the GOP is in a rough situation.

My intuition, somewhat backed by polling suggests a Biden / Trump matchup is probably Biden's best chance of reelection. Biden support appears soft--but it also was soft in 2020, Biden largely won not because he was strong but because Trump was loathed. Even the best Trump vs Biden polling, just show Biden pulling bad numbers, they don't show Trump improving on his 2020 numbers. They all show Trump in the 45-46% range...which is how he actually performed in 2020. If 45-46% was enough to win the election, Trump would be in his second term now. It is telling these polls show people not wanting to pick Biden, but not increasing Trump's vote share.

Those people aren't going to remain undecided, and most won't sit at home. Trump time and again has proven to be a big motivator of squishy Dem turnout after 2016, almost like that segment of the electorate learned a painful lesson about "staying home" out of frustration with the Dem party from Trump's victory.

A lot of the voters involved are suburbanites, a segment of whom did vote Trump in 2016. Many of them, particularly suburban women in the Midwest and PA, appear to have permanently soured on Trump's personal brand. But IMO they are much more open to voting for a Republican who can "be less offensive", and that isn't a high bar. DeSantis and Tim Scott both are genuinely less offensive than Trump, and IMO would be able to claw back some 2016 Trump voters in the PA / WI / MI suburbs.

IMO the best thing for the GOP would be a Tim Scott candidacy. I think DeSantis is very lacking in personal charisma, which could be a weakness that doesn't fully materialize until the general.

I also don't see how anyone beats Trump in the primaries. I almost wonder if these other Republicans are just running on the hopes that the various criminal cases against Trump reach a level that makes his candidacy impossible and they hope to swoop in.

On top of all that, if somehow one of these guys did beat Trump in the primaries, Trump is not a gracious loser. He is going to spend his time railing against the GOP and saying they stole the nomination from him. I don't see how that doesn't massively fuck over the GOP's performance in '24. So the best outcome would have been for Trump not to have ran, but that isn't the world the GOP is in.

[Admiral Yi]

I'm dismayed by Biden's announcement that he will seek reelection.  I hope he pulls a Johnson and pulls out later.

[Sheilbh]

I don't buy it. DeSantis gambled and won on Covid-19 and good for him. But his bumbling in Florida and his bumbling handling Trump doesn't make him look dangerous like Orban. His anti-woke and populist messaging as a bland guy in a suit isn't exactly electrifying. I find him hard to take seriously. His recent Elon Musk fail just shows what an amateur hour politician he is.

I will certainly eat my words if I am wrong but in this case I vastly prefer the devil I don't know to the one I do.

Also I think DeSantis shows every sign of making the same mistake all the 2016 nominees did with Trump. My view for GOP politicians is that the way to beat Trump is through Trump. You can't pussyfoot around him because you want to win all the non-Trump supporters and then get the backing of Trump supporters (and perhaps Trump as well).

It doesn't work, it's inauthentic and voters can tell. I think it failed for Rubio, Cruz and most of the other 2016 candidates - and it seems to be the strategy DeSantis is going for. I think any GOP politician who wants to win will have to do it by beating Trump - and that means taking him on. That isn't necessarily running as a never Trumper - it could go to quite a dark place (if DeSantis wants to win, I suspect that's the line he'd need to take).

I also think, as OVB says, DeSantis is seriously lacking in charisma which I think is an issue in running against Trump.

[Valmy]

I'm dismayed by Biden's announcement that he will seek reelection.  I hope he pulls a Johnson and pulls out later.

Yeah. Me to. I thought there was some kind of unspoken agreement that he was conscripted just because getting Trump out of office was such a priority that we needed some steadying and non-scary Obama hold over. He seemed like he was doing this act of public service and then stepping aside for the younger generation. Granted Kamala Harris was a dud as a hand picked successor but...was that particularly surprising after the Democratic Primary?

But I guess that is a danger of having unspoken agreements. So now we are looking at the prospect of two not particularly liked men in their 70s running for President.