Here’s some fun news.
Joe Walsh, a pugnacious former congressman, is preparing a Republican primary challenge to President Trump that he previewed as a daily “bar fight” with the incumbent over his morality and competency.
Mark Sanford, a former South Carolina governor and congressman, said he is inching closer to a bid of his own by sounding out activists in New Hampshire and other early-voting states about an insurgency focused on the ballooning deficit.
Jeff Flake, a former Arizona senator and Trump antagonist, said he has taken a flurry of recruitment calls in recent days from GOP donors rattled by signs of an economic slowdown and hungry for an alternative to Trump.
And former Ohio governor John Kasich will head to New Hampshire next month to “take a look at things” after experiencing “an increase” in overtures this summer, an adviser said.
The anti-Trump movement inside the Republican Party — long a political wasteland — is feeling new urgency to mount a credible opposition to Trump before it’s too late.
Sanford, I think, hits the nail on the head when he calls these challenges—including his own—”preposterous,” but there’s still value in challenging Trump. As the reporters Bob Costa and Phil Rucker note, “anti-Trump organizers are courting wealthy independents or even liberals to contribute in the GOP primary, if only to bruise the president and help the eventual Democratic nominee in the general election.”
So my message to Republican candidates who are disgusted by Trump is pretty simple: if you can’t bring yourself to follow Tom Nichols’ advice to vote for the Democrats in 2020, feel free to jump into the race and siphon off a few protest votes. It can’t hurt!
The forces of reaction depend upon the American left to splinter its vote, “voting one’s dream!” etc, etc. but usually make certain not to splinter their own reactionary vote. There were a lot of third party votes in 2016, which likely decided the election.
It would be great to watch (several?) Repubs denounce the incompetent Der Trumper and he insult them and their failed “conservative” strategy right back—the insult comic National Trumpalist v. the more genteel “conservative” failures and CEO errand boys (like Flake and Kasich). Of course, trading insults was largely what happened in the Repub primary of 2016, so presumably none of these Repub failures would decide to soldier on as a third party candidate after Trumper’s white nationalist minions annihilate any NeverTrumper challengers.
But would a NeverTrumper third party simply take votes away from the Dem? Another way of asking this is: didn’t most NeverTrumpers vote for him anyway, and won’t they just do it again? Sanford, I think, has already said that Der Trumper is superior to every Dem in the race, so he’s both a moral pygmy and intellectual imbecile, as well as being a phony “NeverTrumper”. And Flake is so obviously feckless that he would likely fear even to trade insults when faced with the actual Trumper.
“But would a NeverTrumper third party simply take votes away from the Dem?”
Maybe? I’m not 100% sure. I’m more interested in the entertainment value than anything at this point.
But yeah, it’s a risk to be sure.
Don’t forget Bill Weld.
https://www.weld2020.org/about
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a28669772/bill-weld-republican-primary-iowa/