Does Trump Even Stand a Chance of Being Elected Again

Leaving Washington, D.C., backside, the Trumps lath Air Force I at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on January. 20, hours before President Biden'due south inauguration. Pete Marovich/Pool/Getty Images hide caption

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Leaving Washington, D.C., behind, the Trumps board Air Strength One at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on January. xx, hours earlier President Biden'due south inauguration.

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The Senate had a test vote this calendar week that cast deep doubt on the prospects for convicting former President Donald Trump on the impeachment accuse now pending against him. Without a two-thirds majority for conviction, there will non be a second vote in the Senate to bar him from future federal part.

Also this calendar week, Political leader released a Morn Consult poll that found 56% of Republicans saying that Trump should run again in 2024. Every bit he left Washington, D.C., on Jan. 20, he said he expected to be "back in some form."

And so will he seek a comeback? And if he does, what are his chances of returning to the White House?

History provides little guidance on these questions. There is piffling precedent for a former president running once more, let lone winning. But since when has the lack of precedent bothered Donald Trump?

Just one president who was defeated for reelection has come dorsum to win over again. That was Grover Cleveland, first elected in 1884, narrowly defeated in 1888 and elected once more in 1892.

Another, far better-known president, Theodore Roosevelt, left part voluntarily in 1908, assertive his hand-picked successor, William Howard Taft, would continue his policies. When Taft did non, Roosevelt came back to run confronting him four years after.

The Republican Political party establishment of that time stood by Taft, the incumbent, then Roosevelt ran every bit a tertiary-political party candidate. That dissever the Republican vote and handed the presidency to Democrat Woodrow Wilson.

And that's information technology. Bated from those two men, no defeated White House occupant has come dorsum to claim votes in the Balloter College. Democratic President Martin Van Buren, defeated for reelection in 1840, sought his party's nomination in 1844 and 1848 just was denied information technology both times. The latter time he helped found the anti-slavery Free Soil Party and ran as its nominee, getting x% of the pop vote but winning no states.

More than than a few former presidents may have been fix to leave public life by the end of their fourth dimension at the meridian. Others surely would have liked to stay longer, but they were sent packing, either by voters in November or past the nominating apparatus of their parties.

There have besides been eight presidents who have died in part. Four in the 1800s (William Harrison, Zachary Taylor, Abraham Lincoln and James Garfield) were succeeded by lackluster vice presidents who were not nominated for a term on their own. Four in the 1900s (William McKinley, Warren Harding, Franklin D. Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy) were succeeded by vice presidents whose parties did nominate them for a term in their own right (Theodore Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge, Harry Truman and Lyndon Johnson).

Each of these four went on to win a term on his ain, and each then left office voluntarily. As noted above, Theodore Roosevelt later changed his mind, and Johnson began the 1968 main season as an incumbent and a candidate simply concluded his run at the end of March.

The Jackson model

A statue of President Andrew Jackson in Lafayette Foursquare near the White House in June. Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

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A statue of President Andrew Jackson in Lafayette Foursquare well-nigh the White House in June.

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One model that might exist meaningful for Trump at this phase is that of President Andrew Jackson, who ran for president 3 times and arguably won each time. His first campaign, in 1824, was a four-style competition in which he clearly led in both the pop vote and the Balloter College but lacked the needed majority in the latter.

That sent the effect to the Business firm of Representatives, where each state had one vote. A protracted and dubious negotiation involving candidates and congressional ability brokers subsequently denied Jackson the prize. He immediately denounced that issue as a "decadent bargain," laying the groundwork for another bid. In 1828, Jackson was swept into office, ousting the incumbent on a wave of populist fervor.

It is not an accident that Trump, following the advice of onetime adviser Steve Bannon, spoke agreeably of Jackson in 2016. When he entered the White Firm, Trump hung Jackson's presidential portrait in the Oval Part overlooking the Resolute Desk-bound.

Information technology is not difficult to imagine Trump invoking the spirit of Jackson'due south 1828 campaign confronting the "corrupt bargain," if he runs in 2024 against "the steal" (his shorthand for the outcome of the 2022 election, which he falsely claims was illegitimate).

Jackson, the ultimate outsider in his own fourth dimension, makes a far better template for Trump than either Cleveland or Teddy Roosevelt — fifty-fifty though the latter 2 were New Yorkers like Trump.

Two New York governors, 2 decades apart

For now, Cleveland remains the only ii-term president who had a time out between terms. When he kickoff won in 1884, he was the first Democratic president elected in 28 years, and he won past the micro-margin of just 25,000 votes nationwide. He won because he carried New York, where he was governor at the time, adding its electoral votes to those of Democratic-leaning states in the South – which preferred a Democratic Yankee to a Republican Yankee.

The latter, James Blaine of Maine, was widely known equally "Slippery Jim," and his reputation made him repugnant to the more reform-minded members of his own party. Blaine was also faulted in that campaign for failing to renounce a zealous supporter who had called Democrats the party of "rum, Romanism and rebellion." That phrase, which has lived on in infamy, was a derogatory reference to Democrats' "moisture" sentiments on the issue of alcohol also as to the Roman Catholics and one-time secessionists to exist found in the political party tent.

Potent as information technology was, that linguistic communication backfired by alienating enough Catholics in New York to elect Cleveland, himself a Protestant. His margin in his home state was a mere one thousand votes, but it was enough to deliver a majority in the Balloter College.

After Cleveland's first term, the election was excruciatingly shut again. The salient issue of 1888 was the tariff on appurtenances from foreign countries. Republicans were for it, making an argument not dissimilar Trump's own America First rhetoric of 2016. Cleveland, on the other hand, said the tariff enriched large business organization merely hurt consumers. He won the national popular vote just not the Electoral College, having fallen xv,000 votes brusk in his home state of New York.

But Cleveland scarcely broke pace. He continued to campaign over the ensuing years and hands won the Democratic nomination for the tertiary consecutive fourth dimension in 1892. He so dismissed the 1-term incumbent to whom he had lost in 1888, Benjamin Harrison, who received less than a third of the Electoral College vote.

A statue of Theodore Roosevelt in New York City. After leaving function, Roosevelt tried unsuccessfully to return to the White House. David Dee Delgado/Getty Images hide explanation

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A statue of Theodore Roosevelt in New York City. Later leaving office, Roosevelt tried unsuccessfully to return to the White House.

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Cleveland stepped down subsequently his second term, equally other reelected presidents had seen fit to practise in emulation of George Washington. The Republicans reclaimed the presidency with William McKinley in 1896 and four years later renominated him with a new running mate who brought youth and vigor to the ticket. Just 41 at the time, Theodore Roosevelt had nonetheless been a police commissioner, a "Rough Passenger" cavalry officer in the Spanish-American War and governor of New York.

Less than a year into that term, McKinley was fatally shot, making Roosevelt president at age 42 (withal the record for youngest chief executive). He won a term of his own in 1904 and promptly pledged not to run again. True to his word, in 1908 he handed off to his hand-picked successor, Taft.

Roosevelt did so assertive Taft would go on his policies. But if Roosevelt had managed to notice entreatment as both a populist effigy and a progressive, Taft more than often stood with the party'due south business organization-oriented regulars. So "T.R." decided to challenge Taft for the Republican nomination in 1912.

He did well in the nascent "primary elections" held that year, simply Taft had the party machinery and controlled the convention. Roosevelt led his delegates out of the convention and organized a 3rd party, the Progressive Party (known colloquially every bit the "Balderdash Moose" party).

That fall, Roosevelt had his revenge on Taft and the GOP. The incumbent Taft finished a poor third with just 8 votes in the Electoral College. But Roosevelt was not the main beneficiary, finishing a distant second to Wilson, the Democrat, who had 435 balloter votes to Roosevelt'south 88. Although the two Republican rivals' combined pop vote would have hands bested Wilson, dividing the party left them both in his wake.

A warning to the GOP?

That is the model some Republicans may fearfulness seeing played out in 2024. If nominated, Trump would need to replicate Cleveland's unique feat from the 1890s, and he would need to overcome the demographics and voter trends that have enabled Democrats to win the popular vote in seven of the last 8 presidential cycles.

And if he is not nominated, Trump running as an independent or as the nominee of a 3rd party would surely split the Republican vote and make a repeat of 1912 highly likely.

Withal, the grip Trump has on half or more of the GOP voter base makes him not only formidable but unavoidable as the party plans for the midterm elections in 2022 and the ultimate question of a nominee in 2024.

To exist clear, Trump has non said he will run again in 2024. On the day he left Washington he spoke of a return "in some form" but was vague about how that might happen. He has sent aides to discourage talk of his forming a 3rd party.

For the time being, at least, Trump seems intent on wielding influence in the Republican Party he has dominated for the past five years — making it clear he volition be involved in primaries in 2022 confronting Republicans who did not support his campaign to overturn the election results.

That is no idle threat. Virtually Trump supporters have shown remarkable loyalty throughout the post-election traumas, even after the riot in the U.S. Capitol. The fierceness of that attachment has sobered those in the GOP who had idea Trump's era would wane later he was defeated. Only Trump has been able to concur the popular imagination inside his party, largely by convincing many that he was not defeated.

The results of the ballot accept been certified in all 50 states by governors and state officials of both parties, and there is no evidence for whatsoever of the conspiracy theories questioning their validity. Nonetheless, multiple polls have shown Trump supporters continue to believe he was unjustly removed from office.

Assuming Trump is not convicted on his impeachment charge of inciting an insurrection before the Jan. 6 invasion of the Capitol, he will non face up a ban on future campaigns.

Some believe Trump might still exist kept out of federal function by an invocation of the 14th Amendment. That office of the Constitution, added subsequently the Ceremonious War with one-time Confederate officers in mind, banned any who had "engaged in insurrection" confronting the government.

Just that wording could well be read to require action against the government, non only incitement of others to activeness by incendiary spoken communication. Information technology could also require lengthy litigation in federal courts and a balancing of the 14th Amendment with the complimentary speech communication protections of the First Amendment.

All that can be said at this point is that the former president will settle into a mail service-presidential routine far from his previous homes in Washington and New York City. And the greatest obstruction to his return to power would seem to be the pattern of history regarding the post-presidential careers of his predecessors.

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Source: https://www.npr.org/2021/01/30/961919674/could-trump-make-a-comeback-in-2024