I get that presidential primaries can get ugly, and no one wants to see members of their own party bloodying each other up when the real focus should be on Biden and how he and the Democrats have hurt America in just a few short years.
Donald Trump wants to be president again, and I don’t blame him. Regardless of whether you believe fraud impacted the results of the 2020 election or not, one thing is very much certain: the pandemic allowed for illegal changes in election laws that made in easier for Democrats to bank votes. And then there was the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story (orchestrated by the Biden campaign), which polls have shown would have changed the way people voted.
So yeah, I get it. And I’d love to see Trump get his revenge, too. But I don’t get what he’s doing now.
For instance, he’s attacking Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis mercilessly. DeSantis isn’t even officially in the race, yet he’s Trump’s favorite target. And in attacking DeSantis, Trump is sounding more like a Democrat. For starters, this week he sided with Disney in its war with DeSantis. “Disney’s next move will be the announcement that no more money will be invested in Florida because of the Governor,” Mr. Trump wrote on Truth Social. “In fact, they could even announce a slow withdrawal or sale of certain properties, or the whole thing. Watch! That would be a killer. In the meantime, this is all so unnecessary, a political STUNT!”
Let’s be serious here. Disney has too much invested in Florida to pack up and go. This suggestion by Trump is absurd.
While Trump is attacking DeSantis constantly, one person he won’t attack is California Gov. Gavin Newsom.
“He was always very nice to me, said the greatest things. He would say things like, ‘He’s doing a great job,'” he recalled. “That’s why I could never hit him, because he was so nice to me.”
This is hardly the first time he’s favored Democrats over Republicans who he feels have wronged him. Despite having endorsed Brian Kemp for governor of Georgia in 2018, Kemp’s failure to do as Trump wanted in 2020 after reports of election fraud in the state made Trump turn on him, and in 2021 Trump actually suggested that Stacey Abrams would be a better governor for Georgia. “Of course, having her I think might be better than having your existing governor, if you want to know the truth,” he said.
Trump: Stacey Abrams is better than Brian Kemp. pic.twitter.com/EtF3QsjOlw
— Unfiltered☢Boss (@Unfilteredboss1) March 30, 2023
“Trump dominated the field in 2016 when he was hitting everyone from the Right,” Matt Walsh of the Daily Wire observed on Twitter. “Now he’s doing exactly the opposite. And it isn’t even a coherent political strategy but purely a reaction to DeSantis.”
It’s true. Trump currently holds a commanding lead in the race for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. He needs to stop acting like a low-tier primary candidate desperately trying to stand out by being the opposite of his competitors.
Trump has a wealth of achievements from his first term to showcase, and he can leverage them to paint a clear picture of the positive impact his policies had on the nation compared to the failures of the Biden administration. It’s counterproductive for Trump to waste valuable campaign time and energy disparaging fellow Republicans such as Ron DeSantis. This tactic is unlikely to resonate with most Republican voters and may even alienate them long term.
