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The Rise and Fall of Donald Trump Has Arrived

President Donald J. Trump displays his signature after signing an Executive Order on Protecting American Monuments, Memorials, and Statues and Combating Recent Criminal Violence, Friday, June 26, 2020, in the Oval Office of the White House. (Official White House Photo by Tia Dufour)
President Donald J. Trump displays his signature after signing an Executive Order on Protecting American Monuments, Memorials, and Statues and Combating Recent Criminal Violence, Friday, June 26, 2020, in the Oval Office of the White House. (Official White House Photo by Tia Dufour)

Watch Donald Trump Rise and Fall All Over Again? Conservatives are starting to worry whether a deeply fragmented primary field will play to Donald Trump’s advantage.

And that if Donald Trump wins the GOP primary, he will lose the general election to Joe Biden – again.

“It is a five-alarm fire,” a prominent Republican donor said. “And there is nobody coming to put it out.”

Apparently, Republicans – members, donors, strategists, everyone – are discussing how to prevent Trump from leveraging a split field to his advantage, from winning the nomination, losing the presidency, and ultimately costing the GOP an opportunity to retake the Senate and keep the House.

Koch Brother groups (Americans For Prosperity and Club for Growth), typically a reliable sign of which way the wind is blowing within he GOP, indicated they preferred to throw their resources towards a non-Trump candidate.

Other party insiders feel similarly, that the question of how to stop Trump “is the one they need to find an answer to before too many contenders start piling into the race.”

Donald Trump: GOP’s 2024 Concerns Echo 2016

“If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed,” a Republican Senator tweeted. “And we will deserve it.”

The tweet sounds like it could have been fired off this week, but it is from the 2016 primary. (The best part is that the tweet is from Lindsey Graham who has been one of Trump’s biggest sycophants since the day he secured the 2016 nomination.)

The Point is conservatives were having a roughly identical conversation eight years ago, when the GOP primary was packed with everyone from Jeb Bush to Ted Cruz to Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina.

The concerns that Trump could not prevail in the general election, were for naught; Trump defeated the perpetually defeatable Hillary Clinton (although he lost the popular vote) while Republicans preserved majorities in the House and Senate.

But conservatives are worried that this time around is different.

Republicans have lost faith in Trump, in his ability to win another presidential election – not after spending three consecutive years whining about the 2020 election (which he lost by seven million votes), nor after his hand-picked candidates were destroyed in the 2022 midterms.  

“I don’t think it is fair to call Donald Trump a damaged candidate,” Eric Levine, a top GOP fundraiser, said.

“He is a metastasizing cancer who if he is not stopped is going to destroy the party. Donald Trump is a loser. He is the first president since Hoover to lose the House, the Senate, and the presidency in a single term. Because of him Chuck Schumer is the Leader Schumer, and the progressive agenda is threatening to take over the country. And he is probably the only Republican in the country, if not the only person in the country, who can’t beat Joe Biden.”

Will GOP rally around a Trump alternative?

Several prominent candidates are expected to enter the GOP primary.

Nikki Haley, Mike Pence, Mike Pompeo, Tim Scott, and so on. But except Ron DeSantis, the candidates will have trouble competing against Trump, who retains his base of zealous loyalists.

The candidates are all being advised that they should not linger in the race if their chances of winning dry up – because doing so will play into Trump’s hand.

As one advisor said: “Does Mike Pence really want his legacy to be that he got four percent of the vote and helped elected Donald Trump?”

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Harrison Kass is the Senior Editor at 19FortyFive. An attorney, pilot, guitarist, and minor pro hockey player, Harrison joined the US Air Force as a Pilot Trainee but was medically discharged. Harrison holds a BA from Lake Forest College, a JD from the University of Oregon, and an MA from New York University. Harrison lives in Oregon and listens to Dokken.

Written By

Harrison Kass is a Senior Defense Editor at 19FortyFive. An attorney, pilot, guitarist, and minor pro hockey player, he joined the US Air Force as a Pilot Trainee but was medically discharged. Harrison has degrees from Lake Forest College, the University of Oregon School of Law, and New York University’s Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. He lives in Oregon and regularly listens to Dokken.