| Get Jonathan Bernstein's newsletter every morning in your inbox. Click here to subscribe. Six months after the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol, the Republican Party is a mess. It's been a mess for a long time; that's a big part of why it wound up nominating a reality TV show host with serious allegations of fraud and sexual assault lodged against him for president in the first place. It's in worse shape now. Where to start? Usually, when a president loses re-election, his party quickly moves on. Republicans in 1992 and Democrats in 1980 thanked George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter for their service and then ignored them. Donald Trump never fell to the popularity lows of either of those one-termers and didn't lose re-election by margins comparable to theirs, but then again he never had the periods of solid popularity that they had — or an initial impressive win. Trump is popular among Republicans, but that's less of an accomplishment than it seems. Most partisan voters like most of their party's politicians! Republicans could have moved on, during a period where the danger in doing so was as low as it's likely to be, and they chose not to. Part of the reason was that Trump didn't act like Bush, Carter or any other former president. Not only is he whining nonstop about his usual grievances, and adding false claims about fraud in the 2020 election, but he's pressuring candidates up and down the Republican Party to go along with his increasingly anti-democratic rants. Among other things, this has meant that Republicans have lost a made-to-order opportunity supplied by the Jan. 6 attack. Mainstream Republicans could have looked good by consistently condemning the attack, thereby distancing themselves from organized hate groups involved in the event. Instead, they're stuck defending the indefensible and making it a major part of Republican messaging, while allowing their leading voices to be … well, let's call them the high-profile Republicans least likely to appeal to swing voters. This is most important in its effect on readying the party to govern when it next gets a chance at the national level, and to some extent it's making governing at the state level more and more difficult. The Republican agenda right now is a combination of three things: Opposition to whatever President Joe Biden and the Democrats propose; support for whatever Fox News Channel's product of the month happens to be; support for whatever incoherent and self-serving whims come out of Trump's mouth. This is barely a formula for making the strongest supporters happy. It's certainly no way to build a policy agenda. What has been a problem for the party for several years, especially at the national level, is only getting worse. As far as elections? It doesn't matter much politically that Republicans aren't prepared to govern. For the most part, out-parties just don't matter much during mid-term elections or when there's an incumbent president seeking re-election. But the evidence for that is based on normal parties in normal election years, and there are at least two ways that Republicans may be risking disaster. One is about candidates. We've seen Republicans lose elections they could have won by nominating fringe candidates. It's still unlikely, but certainly possible, that they could wind up with another round of that in 2022 and 2024 — or that otherwise generic or better candidates could turn themselves into fringers by spending more effort trying to impress Trump than appealing to actual voters. Trump's nomination endorsements are a key wild card. At times they've seemed strategic, with Trump picking good general-election candidates and backing ones who were going to win anyway. But at times he's seemed arbitrary, choosing the best flatterer or otherwise undermining the party's interests. The other risk is that the party could wind up incapable of running a regular campaign because its feels obliged to follow whatever Trump says, rather than what's popular in their districts — that at worst, Republicans run on contesting the 2020 election. Perhaps that still would make little difference, and Biden's popularity will be more important than whatever the out-party says. We can't be sure that evidence from previous elections applies, because nothing like that has ever happened. It's also possible that Trump will have faded away a year from now, and Republicans will run a solid — a normal — campaign. I suppose it's even possible that Trump will still be as prominent in the party, but he'll hire a few solid campaign professionals and take their advice … well, that's not plausible, is it? If I had to guess, I'd stick with my first instinct — that Republican Party dysfunction matters a lot to its future ability to govern competently, but won't have any serious effect on the 2022 elections. But I can't say I'm as confident about that as I was six months ago. 1. Emma Campbell-Mohn at the Monkey Cage on Pope Francis and Europe. 2. Steven S. Smith on unanimous consent agreements in the Senate. 3. Thomas B. Edsall on Trump support and partisanship. 4. Chabeli Carrazana on more evidence of gender equality in the Biden administration. A huge, important story. 5. David Gans on the Supreme Court and the 1965 Voting Rights Act. 6. And Perry Bacon Jr. on the future of the Bernie Sanders faction of the Democratic Party. Very good. I think the Vermont senator's followers have established themselves as an important group within the party, and that's where they will probably stay for a while. That's an accomplishment, and as Bacon says it has consequences, even if it's far short of the takeover some of them had hoped for. Get Early Returns every morning in your inbox. Click here to subscribe. Also subscribe to Bloomberg All Access and get much, much more. You'll receive our unmatched global news coverage and two in-depth daily newsletters, the Bloomberg Open and the Bloomberg Close. | 
Post a Comment