What's the Democratic strategy for defeating the next Trump?

Politics & Elections
1

No future Republican candidate is likely to have the secret sauce that Trump had, in terms of his mysterious charisma. Every Republican who tried to imitate him, such as Cruz or Vance, just fell flat on their face. It’s clear Trump had something that worked for him that didn’t work for anyone else. So, at least, the Ds have that going for them - there won’t be an exact Trump 2.0 coming along again.

But, looking at the big picture, despite a decade of experience, like a head coach facing the same opponent for 10 seasons in a row, Democrats still show no sign they have found any effective strategy for beating a Trump-like candidate.

Fact-checking and calling the candidate a liar = doesn’t work.

Calling him (or her) a racist, transphobe, Islamophobe, sexist, bigot, homophobe, etc. = doesn’t work.

Calling him or her a fascist, and warning about Nazism = doesn’t work.

Pointing out countless contradictions = doesn’t work.

Pointing out that the populist Trump candidate won’t deliver on any of his promises = doesn’t work.

Counting on women or racial minority voters to turn out to beat such a candidate = doesn’t work.

Warning voters, “We are in danger of losing our democracy” = doesn’t work.

Doing peaceful protesting, like No Kings = doesn’t work.

Doing a get-out-the-vote operation = doesn’t work; Democrats didn’t show up in 2016 or 2024.

Outspending such a candidate = doesn’t work; IIRC, Democrats outspent Trump in every single one of his 3 elections.

Hoping the media will convey to the American public the dangers of such a candidate = doesn’t work.

Touting Democratic successes = doesn’t work, Trump won after Obama, and Trump won after Biden.

Hoping voters have tired of Trump-like candidates = doesn’t seem reliable at all.

Impeachment and criminal indictments = doesn’t work, Trump won reelection despite two impeachments and 37 charges.

Criticism of insurrection = doesn’t work, Trump won after Jan-6.

Attack ads and negative campaigning = doesn’t work.

Promo ads and positive campaigning = doesn’t work.

So what’s the plan to stop the next Trump in 2028 or 2032?

2

Have better candidates? Obama would have beaten him. Probably easily.

3

Most of the OP is stated with too much certainty.

And Vance is pretty consistently more popular, or less unpopular, than Trump:

Vance Approval Polling
Trump Approval Polling

As for messaging that can reliably defeat right wing populists, it doesn’t now exist. But wait. There is a high probability that Trump’s unpopularity will increase because of something worse – from a swing voter perspective – happening than anything seen so far in Trump 45 or 47. It is thus too soon to say what Democratic Party messaging should be next time.

I hate to wish for the worse, but if the economy truly crashes in 2027 and 2028, and rebounds as soon as there is a Democratic president, we should become immune to the right wing populist virus for a generation. Maybe two generations. This is an area where it is better to be lucky than smart. The unlucky thing would be if a Democratic president takes office in January 2029 and the Trump-caused depression only hits a month or two later.

A long term strategy could be federal aid to high school civics instruction. This must be done carefully so it is correctly perceived as democracy education rather than Democratic Party education.

4

Provide something/someone people crave to vote FOR, rather than continue to play defense.

Hell if I have any idea WHAT that would look like.

5

Its a good question I’ve wondered, and I don’t have an answer.

The reality is there are 70+ million people who will always pull the lever for anyone with an R next to their name. No matter how many children they rape, no matter how much treason they commit, no matter how incompetent they are, no matter how they trash democracy, no matter how many crimes they commit, no matter how much they destroy our alliances and help China become the next superpower, no matter how much they destroy our reputation, etc. As long as they believe in christian dominionism, white supremacy and patriarchy; and have an -R, they are going to win 70+ million votes.

I think trumps malignant narcissism is a plus to his voters. Trump’s mental illness means he can never accept responsibility or accept that he is wrong. To a lot of his supporters I think that comes across as strong. I think that is something a lot of people who want to be Trump can’t replicate. You can’t pretend to replicate a serious mental illness like that. Sadly we are the same species who treat epileptics and people in psychosis as messengers of god, and now we are treating a malignant narcissist as a powerful leader.

I don’t have an answer, but the question worries me. The only thing that would change it is if enough Americans decide they don’t like this. But that doesn’t seem like it’ll happen.

The only way for that to happen is for Americans who disagree with this to vote more, or people who agree with this to vote less, or people who agree with this to change their minds. I don’t see any of that happening.

6

Excellent suggestion. Joe Biden, far from optimal, beat Trump.

How to exist alongside all of the utter morons who voted for Trump? Wow. The question of a nation’s life.

7

Better than Trump??? That would be almost everyone that ever ran against him, so we can take that option right off the table.

8

Better than the candidates that he beat.

9

Joe Biden barely beat Trump. Trump fucked up covid and the economy collapsed right before the election. Also its harder for a president to win a 2nd term than a first term.

Despite that, Trump still won 75 million votes to Biden’s 81 million. It wasn’t a blowout.

This is the real question. How do we coexist with people whose morals, values and cognition we do not respect.

10

For example…?

11

Yes, but seriously, Biden beat Trump.

12

I’d be guessing. I can guess, if you want.

13

People like Trump because they like his vibe. It’s not about results really, it’s about saying fuck you to the entire system. Openly and directly. Never backing down from the system. Trump is good at that. And because it’s not results based, he never gets held accountable for horrible results. It’s the vibe people like and vote for. They want the vibe, seemingly at all costs.

You counter that by saying that kind of politician actually does have a cost. I can see why the vibe attracted you, but it’s costing you:
They are corrupt. Corruption has a cost. This is what that corruption could have paid for (instead of a ballroom, we could had healthcare subsidies; endless examples). You are paying for that ballroom and expensive healthcare.
They are incompetent. That incompetence has a cost. This is what it cost you (they mistakenly fired people who protect our nuclear materials and then had to rehire them in a disorganized mess; endless examples). You pay for the firing, the rehiring, and the disorganization and risk it creates.
They are reckless. That recklessness has a cost. It started an unprovoked war with Iran. That war costs us American lives, billions of dollars, etc.

On and on, forever and ever.

Late: you of course offer an alternative solution. Anything really, but something fairly concrete w/o worry of who doesn’t like it.

14

All these things worked for Biden.

Generally the RWP loses the vote next election, when the voters find out they have been lied to, and all those promises were bogus.

Right.

The thing will be the economy. The Dems have to hammer on trumps failures to beat inflation. It worked for trump and the GOP last election- of course trump lied and said he could fix inflation with the stroke of a pen. But this time the GOPs only way out is to lie (assuming that is, the Economy doesnt take a huge turn for the better).

Hammer the GOP with the War on Iran- massively unpopular, even among Republicans.

Pretty decent ideas.

15

Those things only “worked” for Biden the first time, in a once-in-a-century pandemic, and only by the narrowest of margins. Trump was less than one football stadium’s worth of voters away from flipping Georgia, Arizona and Wisconsin and winning outright. And the second time around, Biden was on path to lose to Trump in a landslide.

Saying it worked for Biden in 2020 is like saying NASA got away with the O-rings in cold weather because they didn’t blow up a shuttle the first time. Challenger is just waiting around the corner.

16

Sure, because Inflation started during the trump administration, and Biden barely managed to get it somewhat under control. Biden lost due to Inflation. The voters tend to blame the economy on the President, which isnt really fair, but oh well.

This next time- inflation will likely work against the GOP. The Dems can certainly blame the large increase in gas prices on trump and the Iran “war”.

17

The answer to defeating the next Trump, or even a LEFT wing populist is to adopt legislation (possibly including a Constitutional Amendment) that enacts laws similar to England or several other nations: News organizations (broadcast, net based, etc.) that deliberately air nonsense, especially without retractions need to be heavily sanctioned. How much is Trump’s particular evil goo, how much is an underlying hatred of the others in our population, and how much is Faux News (and others) covering up his failures and abuses is a matter of constant argument, but the fact is Fox and it’s allies are a large part of keeping people unaware of how bad everything is.

I’m not saying the British model is exactly what I’d adopt (after all, it doesn’t cover how many people this days get 100% of their information online), but it would work as a starting point on such things.

18

No. Unequivocally no to that proposal. England is continuously passing worse and worse anti free speech laws.

You want to beat the Republicans? Stop complaining about Fox News and the like. You’ll never convert a hardcore watcher. Actually do things that people want. Propose things that are broadly popular and don’t load them down with technocratic means testing. “Going back” to pre 2017 doesn’t appeal to anyone for whom the system wasn’t working then either.

19

Trump’s margins were also small. These are close elections. We need to do better, but not necessarily much, much better, to win.

20

Well, I’m not sure, as I’m not a political science guy. But I think the Dems need to focus on three things:

  1. Don’t be the party of the status quo/establishment. Be the party that wants to reform things. How did Dems allow the Pubs to be seen as populist who want to reform things? That should never happen. If Dems think people want to go back to 2014, they’ll be missing the moment.

  2. Be the anti-corruption party. I think voters will be sick of MAGA/Trump corruption by the time he leaves. Jon Ossoff is doing a good job talking about corruption this year.

  3. They need to communicate in more simple slogans, and be willing to compete all over America. Red areas. Urban areas. Suburban areas. Rural areas. Atlantic Coast. Pacific Coast. Heartland. Southeast. And in the Upper Midwest. Everywhere. You can’t beat the MAGA machine unless you’re willing to to make in-roads in Red’ish areas.