OPINION:
Former President Donald Trump last week made it clear — intentionally or otherwise — that he has no actual intention of running for president again in 2024.
Mr. Trump opened the week by blaming pro-life voters for whatever shortfall the Republicans experienced in the midterm elections. His statement (released on Truth Social) said in relevant part: “It wasn’t my fault that the Republicans didn’t live up to expectations in the MidTerms, I was 233-20! It was the ‘abortion issue,’ poorly handled by many Republicans, especially those that firmly insisted on No Exceptions, even in the case of Rape, Incest, or Life of the Mother, that lost large numbers of Voters. The people that pushed so hard, for decades, against abortion, got their wish from the U.S. Supreme Court, & just plain disappeared, not to be seen again.”
Leaving aside the fact that not a single Republican nominee insisted on a no-exceptions policy with respect to abortion, Mr. Trump’s assertion that the right-to-life community “disappeared” is, of course, unsupported by the evidence at hand. Pretty much every pro-life candidate (with four notable exceptions — Herschel Walker in Georgia, Blake Masters and Kari Lake in Arizona, and Adam Laxalt in Nevada) won election or reelection.
Moreover, Republicans improved their electoral performance in 2022 among pretty much all demographic and ideological groups (Blacks, Hispanics, working-class voters, etc.) compared with 2018 or 2020. The notable exception to that was a drop-off in key races among self-identified Republicans, which no doubt reflected those who voted against … Mr. Trump.
In addition, and unfortunately for Mr. Trump, pro-life voters — energized by his promised judicial selections during the 2016 campaign and animated by his judicial selections as president — have been among his strongest supporters and among the most reliably Republican set of voters. By attempting to transfer the blame for the disappointing performance in 2022 from himself to them, Mr. Trump has successfully alerted Republican primary voters (the overwhelmingly majority of whom are pro-life) that he has now become their adversary.
Not content to antagonize the right-to-life voters, on Wednesday, Mr. Trump decided to involve himself in the contest for speaker of the House. After it had already become clear that Rep.-elect Kevin McCarthy, California Republican, would not be able to get enough votes absent some significant change in circumstances, Mr. Trump issued the following statement on Truth Social on Mr. McCarthy’s behalf:
“Close the deal, take the victory, & watch crazy Nancy Pelosi fly back home to a very broken California, the only speaker in U.S. history to have lost the ‘House’ twice! Republicans do not turn a great triumph into a giant & embarrassing defeat. It’s time to celebrate, you deserve it. Kevin McCarthy will do a good job, and maybe even a great job - just watch!”
Fair enough; everyone is entitled to their own opinion.
Unfortunately for Mr. Trump, that statement, and subsequent phone calls involving the former president — Mr. Trump arranged a call between Mr. McCarthy and Rep.-elect Scott Perry, Pennsylvania Republican, one of the provocateurs — resulted in precisely no change in the votes on the House floor nor in Mr. McCarthy’s trajectory.
For Mr. Trump to become involved in what is essentially a fraternity election without any intention of doing whatever might be necessary to win it was a mistake. Such mistakes are typically not made by people running for president nor encouraged or enabled by competent campaign staff.
These two statements and the attendant lack of urgency in cleaning up either mess, coupled with the general sense of apathy and indifference surrounding his campaign, strongly suggest a candidate and a campaign team uninterested in running and unlikely to win.
• Michael McKenna, a columnist for The Washington Times, co-hosts “The Unregulated Podcast.” He was most recently a deputy assistant to the president and deputy director of the Office of Legislative Affairs at the White House.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.