THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM

Takeover and Consolidation

• This chapter reviews what happened within the Republican Party from 2015 to 2020, with a focus on how Trump managed to win the 2016 presidential nomination with much of the formal party arrayed against him. I draw some comparisons and contrasts with Barry Goldwater’s 1964 nomination; he was an unlikely candidate, but largely achieved that goal by his supporters taking over local party organizations in the years leading up to the election. By contrast, Trump mainly took over the party after winning its nomination.

Local Radicalization

Key to the Trump takeover of the Republican Party was work at the local level. With the help of loyal lieutenants like Steve Bannon, Trump supporters ran for and won many county-level party positions between 2016 and 2021, with a particular drive to do so immediately following the 2020 election. One indicator of increased radicalization of local parties is their use of censures. County parties have occasionally censured officeholders, but only sparingly, with just two or three per year across the country. In 2021, county Republican Party organizations censured more than 20 GOP officeholders, all for a failure to support Donald Trump in his impeachment trial or in his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. These efforts were concentrated in counties with a shrinking white percentage of the population, suggesting this has much to do with racial anxiety among whites.

Narratives and Electability

My previous book suggested that published narratives about why the 2016 election came out as it did affected Democrats’ thinking for the 2020 nomination, altering the sorts of candidates they believed could win. Did this apply to Republicans between 2020 and 2024? I use a survey experiment to see if different news coverage of Trump’s election loss changed what Republicans thought about him as a potential nominee for 2024. Importantly, the findings showed that Trump was still a favorite regardless of the type of media coverage he received or what kinds of media were covering him. However, Republicans who heard critical Trump coverage from a conservative publication tended to assess Trump’s electability poorly – they still wanted him to be President but were less sure he could win. The study suggests that depending on what sort of messaging they heard, Republicans were open to the idea that the party should pick a different nominee for 2024, not because they didn’t like Trump, but because they saw him as an electoral under-performer.

The Fox Primary

One of the things that distinguishes the modern Republican Party from the modern Democratic Party and even from the GOP of just a few decades ago is the central role of conservative media. Fox News, in particular, has become not simply a conservative-leaning news organization but rather an arm of the party, playing a critical role in the nomination of candidates. In 2018, Ron DeSantis became the Republican nominee for Governor in Florida despite running against a primary opponent with greater funding and broader party support in large part because Fox News gave him extensive promotion – he won the “Fox Primary.” This chapter examines the attention given by Fox News to various candidates in Republican Senate and gubernatorial primaries in the 2022 cycle and in the 2024 presidential cycle, examining the role the network plays in picking nominees.

The Invisible Primary

How did the Republican Party ultimately select a 2024 presidential nominee? This chapter looks at the “invisible primary,” the process by which party elites converge on a nominee prior to the first primaries and caucuses of 2024. I make use of a survey of county Republican party chairs starting in early 2023 to understand how these figures were leaning and what information they were using to make a decision.