He’s never going to stop-he likes the attention and publicity. And there isn’t anything short of prison that’s going to be a roadblock for him, and probably not even being locked up. So what happens if natural causes take him (assassination is a whole 'nother issue which I’m not discussing or advocating for, obviously)? Do the Republicans canonize him as a Saint alongside Reagan and all line up behind DeSantis, lackluster personality and uninspiring foreign trip be d*mned?
EDIT: And yes, of course, Biden dying is an equally interesting and plausible question-I just don’t see the Democratic Party imploding to quite the same degree if that happens. But it certainly could deserve its own thread.
I think a lot of Republicans breath a sigh of relief and pay lip service to his “greatness,” while secretly glad they don’t have to worry about his tweets.
Several candidates will fight over his legacy, while others try to put forward a more moderate face.
Ultimately, I think someone like Boebert or Greene emerges as the next face of the party.
This. He’s dead weight, now. I can’t possibly see how he could win again with all that has happened, so the best thing he could do from the Republican point of view is croak. Also, if he dies, all the upcoming litigation goes away and the witnesses never talk on the stand.
I don’t want it to change direction, I want it to collapse into infighting while the country keeps diversifying and makes them increasingly irrelevant. I want them to spend their precious few years bickering amongst themselves.
I Think you’ll see the fighting play out among the kids. Don Jr. will try to be the new MAGA king, while Ivanka will try to rebrand herself as the leader of less raucous movement.
After the mass orgasm and dancing in the streets, then the real questions emerge. If after the convention, presumably the veep nominee moves up a notch and picks a running mate. If before the convention, then in the final primaries the rest of the field carries on or rejoins the race. At the convention his delegates may vote for their beloved Donald on the first ballot, then be free to vote for others in the following ballot(s). If he should win the first ballot, with great sadness they will announce that he can’t accept the nomination, being dead and all, and they need to turn elsewhere.
Other than the procedural mechanics, I think it boils down to who steps up to be the party’s next Dear Leader. DeSantis would love to be, but do they love him back? Maybe, just maybe, the party returns to normal. But I doubt it.
Disagree on Ivanka. I think she’s the smart one among the famous three kids and she recognizes the high level of personal risk involved with being active in high-visibility politics, particularly considering the Trump family’s criminal and crime-adjacent behaviors and associations, and she is clearly signaling she wants to go back to being a lower-profile private rich person.
Vast numbers of people (I’ll let you work out which ones) will be certain that it was an assassination by Biden, almost certainly at the orders of Hugo Chavez.
After all, Trump’s own doctor called him the fittest man ever to become president, and he’s been playing all that golf and carrying the world’s hopes and prayers. How could such a man, and one with his healthy glow, ever fall ill, let alone die?
I look forward to the Go-Fund-Me to carve a fifth, extra-fat head on Mount Rushmore getting underway.
Given his reality-show beginnings, I can see someone unveiling a “hidden letter” after his passing that would anoint his successor as Republican leader. Like a “new will” in a murder mystery. All the right-wing media will go into a frenzy debating it with various “detectives” sniffing around. Whether or not it would be a fake and he’d pop back up afterward for ratings is up to your imagination.
More seriously, would his death have any kind of sobering effect on the party? It seems that no one else has been able to replicate the hypnotic power he has over the GOP, whether it’s due to blackmail material, directing his more rabid Twitter/online followers, or just his brazenly anti-democratic/diversity/women actions and statements that seemed to only increase his popularity (though that may be fading?)
Because the shape he’s in…