For Donald Trump, it’s time to accept that the Grand Old Party’s over | Mulshine - NJ.com

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I think I can say without fear of contradiction that I was among the very first pundits to predict the rise of Donald Trump. I did so as far back as November of 2015, a year before his election as president.

So I hope he listens to me when I tell him it’s time to go.

I’m kidding about him listening to me. Trump doesn’t listen to anyone. That was the key to his rise and also to his fall.

Imagine you were one of Trump’s advisers backstage during that disastrous first debate with Democrat Joe Biden

Before the debate, many observers were curious how the gaffe-prone Biden would stand up to the pressure. But time after time, Trump would let his opponent off the hook by interrupting him before he could get lost in one of his trademark tangled sentences.

At one point the moderator was trying to pin Biden down on why he hadn’t asked the Democratic mayors in places like Portland to crack down on rioting.

As Biden was fumbling around looking for an answer, Trump interrupted him. That gave Biden a chance to change the subject.

And then there’s that Twitter account. The first job of a president is to look presidential. But you can’t look presidential when you’re Tweeting like a teenager.

All these antics helped energize Trump’s base. But for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. And we saw that in the returns from Morris County.

Morris has been dominated by the GOP for so long that naming the last Democrat elected to countywide office there amounts to a trivia question.

The Republicans dominated again this year, at least on the county level. In a race for freeholder, Republican Tayfun Selen beat Democrat Cary Amaro by about 13,000 votes.

As for Trump, he managed to lose the county to Biden by a 13,000-vote margin.

That’s a 26,000-vote anti-Trump swing in a suburban county full of the sort of middle-class and upper-middle class voters who should benefit the most from a Republican president’s economic policies.

We saw a similar result in Bucks County, Pa., another place packed with prosperous suburbanites.

Trump made two appearances there and attracted huge crowds. But on Election Day he lost Bucks to Biden by 16,000 votes. He lost the other three suburban counties outside Philadelphia as well.

That pattern held across the country. Trump somehow managed to lose in a year when Republicans did well in many down-ballot races.

Compare Trump’s record to that of another Republican who came into the presidency as an outsider.

Unlike the Donald, the Ronald didn’t need to go to court to try and secure a second term in the White House.

Reagan built such wide support among Americans that he came within 3,761 votes of a 50-state sweep, losing only his opponent Walter Mondale’s home state of Minnesota.

I imagine that this time around Trump felt he was blindsided by the massive switch to mail-in voting. And perhaps one of his many lawsuits will lead the courts to impose restrictions on the practice.

Such a ruling could help future Republican presidential candidates. And the best course for Trump would be to bow out gracefully while continuing the legal actions that could help the Grand Old Party.

But then Trump was never the sort of guy who puts the interests of the party first.

That was an asset back when he was clearing the 2016 field of such shopworn candidates as Jeb Bush. But it’s a debit now that he’s making noises about a run in 2024.

In the 2020 race, Trump ran ads charging that Biden, who recently turned 78, lacked “the strength, the stamina and the mental fortitude to lead this country.”

If Trump were to make another run he would also be 78. By his own terms he would be over the hill.

And he would still face the problem that dogged him this year. That’s his tendency to turn off suburbanites who could otherwise be convinced to vote Republican.

He did this mostly with style rather than substance. I personally find his wisecracks quite witty. But many others don’t get the joke.

Nonetheless, he did perform a service for his fellow Republicans.

Back in 2016, many of my Republican friends argued that Trump was naïve to think he could steal the Democrats’ blue-collar base from under their noses. But he did it.

His problem was that he failed to broaden that base in 2020. That will be the task of the next Republican who runs for president.

As for Trump, he might consider that he had his greatest success as an outsider.

And that’s what he should remain.

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For Donald Trump, it’s time to accept that the Grand Old Party’s over | Mulshine - NJ.com
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