As voters went to the polls this week, maybe the worst-kept secret was what Donald Trump plans to do in the next election, as for months he has been teasing another bid for the White House in 2024.
And now he has marked a date on the calendar.
“I am going to be making a big announcement on Tuesday November 15 at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida,” Trump told an election-eve rally in Ohio.
More than ready to campaign for Trump is U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Rome, who has become a staple at his rallies.
“Everyone knows the one true leader of the Republican Party — and that’s my favorite President and yours — Donald J. Trump,” Greene said to cheers in Iowa.
Greene also echoed a familiar Trump note about your father’s Republican Party.
“We can no longer be the party of Mitch McConnell, John McCain, Dick Cheney, George Bush, and Mitt Romney,” Greene added.
But while Trump clearly remains the dominant figure in national Republican politics right now, we can’t ignore what happened to him in Georgia this year — as the state’s Republican Establishment proved to be Trump’s Kryptonite.
In the May primary elections, Georgia voters rejected a campaign message based squarely on Trump’s never-ending false claims of election fraud in 2020 — easily defeating Trump’s hand-picked candidates for Governor and Secretary of State.
The GOP concerns about Trump also played a role in keeping him out of Georgia during the fall campaign, as Republicans were worried a visit by Trump might hurt Herschel Walker’s bid for Senate.
But while Georgia was a clear reminder that a good chunk of Republican voters might not want a Trump repeat in 2024, will the GOP really resist the siren song of a third bid for President by Donald Trump?
No one in the GOP has come close to derailing Trump since he arrived on the scene in 2015. But if there is one person who could challenge him in the GOP primaries, it might be Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who easily won a second term this week.
Trump recently gave off a rare sense of concern about his possible GOP rival, labeling DeSantis, “Ron DeSanctimonious.”
That Trump nickname aggravated a number of conservative commentators, who believe DeSantis is a proven leader who might be more capable of winning a national election right now than Trump.
Trump has already turned up the heat — letting reporters know he had unflattering information about DeSantis — clearly threatening to smear the Florida Governor.
The 2022 election still isn’t over in Georgia. But the GOP fight for 2024 is already underway.
Jamie Dupree has covered national politics and Congress from Washington, D.C. since the Reagan administration. His column appears weekly in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. For more, check out his Capitol Hill newsletter at http://jamiedupree.substack.com
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