The simple answer is that Trump is not in power ,and hasn't announced a run for 2024 yet. Why do you think that is? Why do you think that Youngkin never mentioned Trump, and studiously avoided Trump coming to VA to campaign for him?
Again, it's hard to focus on the 2024 Presidential race, when we haven't even had the midterms. My point, which you and mcmurtry disagree with, is that the more involved candidates are with the wingnut Trumper spectrum, the harder it is for those candidates to win in 2022 in purple states. It's not just the craziness of issues like the Big Lie and abortion zealotry, but also the fact that the previous results in purple states in 2018 (when Trump himself was not on the ballot) is that candidates in purple states that he endorsed and campaigned for lost uniformly...
Don't believe me? Look at the results...
In PA- Casey defeated massive Trumper Barletta, 2 years after Trump carried the state vs HRC. Casey won 58-43, and Wolf won the Gov race 58-41...
In MI, Stabenow beat James 52-46, despite Trump winning in 2016. Whitmer won Gov by nearly 10%...
In WI Baldwin beat another massive Trumper Vukmir 55-45. And Evers managed to upset Walker, though the margin was much lower...
And even a state like OH, which was solidly in the Trump camp in 2016 still re-elected a pretty well known liberal in 2018. Brown defeated another Trumper in Renacci by 6 points 53-47. The crazy thing about OH is that in 2018 Kasich was term limited from running and endorsed Devine, a fellow moderate who won with 50% against Cordray's 46. But Cordray (the Dem Gov candidate) still got about 35,000 more votes than Renacci the pro-Trump GOP Senate candidate in the state that Trump won handily 2 yrs earlier.
And the craziest thing is that Renacci (who got 35,000 less votes than the Dem that Dewine beat in the 2018 Gov's race) is running vs Dewine in the GOP Primary in 2022. Renacci could well be the GOP nominee, and if he is it gives the Dem's their best shot at winning the Gov race. And that's in a Red state...
NBC released a poll on "party popularity" today and both the Dems and GOP are underwater. The Gop got a favorable rating from 44%,while the Dems were at 43%. The last time either party was above water was the Dems in 2015, but the reason the GOP is favored in the midterms is that usually the losing Presidential parties voters are more motivated. That's true up till now, but I still think the more looney Trumpers the Pubs nominate,t he better Dem chances are, esp for the Senate... Some interesting analysis...
"Now look at our poll: It finds the GOP split between those who consider themselves more supporters of Trump, versus those who are more supporters of the party — and the pro-party side has been growing since Trump left office. (By the way, Trump has a 90 percent-to-0 percent favorable/unfavorable rating with pro-Trump Republicans, while it’s 62 percent-to-20 percent among pro-party Republicans.)
And the NBC News poll also shows a split inside the Democratic Party — 40 percent of Democrats say they supported Biden during the 2020 primaries, 30 percent say they backed Bernie Sanders and 12 percent sided with Elizabeth Warren. (By the way, President Biden’s approval rating is 92 percent-to-7 percent among Democratic Biden voters, while it’s 74 percent-to-23 percent among Sanders/Warren voters.)"
First Read is your briefing from "Meet the Press" and the NBC Political Unit on the day's most important political stories and why they matter.
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