The GOP could be in for a real roller coaster of a reckoning in November.
Butler, Pa. — After racking her brain for a few seconds, Norma Holm estimates that she’s been to 20 Donald Trump rallies to date. A resident of Hammond, Ind., the “Front Row Joes” jacket-sporting rally-goer says she traveled seven hours to watch the former president’s triumphant return to the Butler fairgrounds, where back in July, a gunman’s fire had grazed Trump’s ear, killed one man, and wounded others.
Holm insists that her 20-rally rally — which could probably put many national political reporters to shame — is nothing compared with the lengths that others Trump supporters will go to demonstrate their fandom. Some Trump-rally regulars arrive two days early so that they can get the best seats in the house, she said. “They sleep on the sidewalk. They secure their area. They come from all over.”
Four weeks out from Election Day, this is the type of Trump superfan who is starting to wrestle with the possibility of a Kamala Harris victory — and what that would mean for a three-time GOP nominee who has said he does not envision running for president again if he loses. “I think that that will be, that will be it,” he said in an interview last month. “I don’t see that at all. I think that, hopefully, we’re gonna be successful.”
The reality that Trump’s days as a candidate are numbered is difficult for voters, politicians, and pundits of all political stripes to grasp nearly a decade after the former president won the 2016 GOP primary and remade the party in his image. For his biggest supporters, there are doubts whether anyone — even his most loyal lieutenants — can replicate the 78-year-old former president’s persona if he loses and steps aside in 2028.
“No. I don’t think that anybody can,” says Holm.
“Oh, I don’t think so,” insists rally-goer Terry Conklin.
“I do not think anybody’s going to be able to replicate it, because Donald Trump is one of a kind,” adds Lori Duncan.
But who will carry the mantle for his movement if he doesn’t? Yes, Trump fans really like Ohio senator J. D. Vance. They praise his ability to intellectualize the former president’s views on the stump and the debate stage, and they say his concise rhetoric and impressive debate skills complement Trump’s meandering speaking style. But among the former president’s die-hard supporters, Vance’s new status as heir apparent may have less to do with his own talents and more with the reality that Trump has picked him as his running mate.
The GOP could be in for a real roller coaster of a reckoning if Trump loses. Even if he steps aside from the 2028 race, it’s hard to imagine an even twice-defeated, soon-to-be octogenarian former president Donald Trump fully retreating from politics. And first comes the 2024 election aftermath. If he loses narrowly and refuses to admit defeat, many Republican lawmakers will likely echo his stolen-election claims in fear of retaliation from their own voters. Others will urge their voters to embrace a new way forward. If Trump loses by a bigger margin than expected, a large cohort of Republicans may try to cobble together a post-Trump coalition that can appeal to moderates without alienating the base voters who are still all-in on Trump. This year’s 2024 GOP primary suggests that will not be easy.
Reflecting on the possibility of GOP defeat in November, rally-goer Lori Duncan of North Huntington, Pa., told National Review that she believes that the Make America Great Again movement transcends one man. “It’s not just about him. It’s about we, the people,” she said as she looked out at a sea of thousands of rally-goers gathered in Butler on Saturday, many of them wearing T-shirts emblazoned with the phrases “Legends Never Die” and “If you come at the king, you best not miss!” in large script.
Trump “obviously started” the MAGA movement and “laid the foundation for it,” she said, but “it is bigger than him.” And even though she’s confident that he will win in November, she acknowledges that someone else must take the mantle eventually. After all, Duncan said, “he’s not going to live forever.”