Trump's 'future prospects are fading fast' as voters look for alternatives: report
According to a report from the Guardian, there is a growing belief that Donald Trump's appeal is fading as conservative voters increasingly look for an alternative for 2024 with Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) running a highly effective stealth campaign to be his successor.
As the Guardian's David Smith wrote, the Florida Republican is acting as if the former president doesn't exist as he steals both the spotlight and donors away from Trump.
According to the report, the testimony of former White House senior aide Cassidy Hutchinson is turning out to be a pivotal point for Trump's future prospects.
As former GOP campaign consultant Rick Wilson explained, Republicans -- including DeSantis -- thinking of challenging the former president were exhilarated by what the former aide to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows told the Jan 6th House committee.
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“Apparently they feel like this was a phenomenal day for them, that it was a great breakdown of Trump’s malfeasance and they didn’t have to bring the attack – it was brought by one of his former loyalists. If you look at it in terms of the 2024 nomination process, it was a consequential day," Wilson said before adding, "I’ve picked up the same rumors that everybody else is hearing that Ron DeSantis’s people are practically picking out curtains in the White House after Tuesday."
Wilson elaborated, "DeSantis has been very carefully building out a presidential campaign for 2024 to primary Donald Trump, raising money, building relationships, going out there and quietly whispering: ‘He’s crazy, I’m not, I’m younger, I’m smarter, I’m thinner, I’m better looking. I can deliver more for you than the crazy old orange guy.'"
Larry Jacobs of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota, suggested that voters don't see Trump as a winning proposition in 2024 with all of his baggage.
“The big question for Republicans moving forward is: do they want to carry this baggage of Trump into 2024?” he proposed. "When you’re battling to win over independent voters and when you’re going to be handed a platform that could very well present a referendum on the insider party, the Democrats, it doesn’t make sense even for a lot of Republican Trump supporters. Trump and his influence and his future prospects are fading fast.”
As for who will replace him, he added, "In the primaries, there’s going to be a battle of who can carry Trumpism without Trump and that’s going to be ethnic nationalism, attacks on the liberal cultural tilt of this moment. You go to a Trump rally, a lot of those lines are going to be evident.”