At that point, what will become of Trump’s party? Will its identity endure, reshaping the American right for decades or even generations to come? Or will it revert to its Reaganesque roots, embracing once more the concepts of limited government and global integration?
“It’s very much an open question,” says Karl Rove, the architect of George W. Bush’s victories and one of few elder statesmen in today’s GOP. “My gut says Trump won’t durably change the party. Republicans are free-traders, and this experiment with protectionism is going to end very badly. People in Ohio and Michigan, they’re going to see how bad protectionism is. We’re anti-communist here; we’re not isolationists. I think the American people know that we’re five percent of the population and twenty-five percent of the world’s economy, and if we want to be prosperous, we can’t just wash each other’s laundry.”
Kellyanne Conway, who is the closest thing to Rove’s counterpart in the Trump universe, sees it differently. “It will be a Trumpian party,” she predicts. “The constant outrage and opprobrium toward Donald Trump miss so much of what he’s knitting together in a sustainable way. His version of ‘America first’ will outlast him. What’s the next Republican president going to say? I’m going to raise taxes? I’m going to add regulations? I think getting back in the Paris accords and the Iran nuclear deal and trade deals that screw American workers are great ideas?”
There is, of course, another potential outcome. Republicans abandoned Bush’s version of the party when it ceased to align with their needs and attitudes, and they will defect from Trumpism just as quickly. But if and when they do, there is no guarantee of a return to the status quo. While Ryan is right that party politics are cyclical, those cycles don’t last forever. The fragmenting of America’s two-party system has so accelerated, in such a condensed window, that its implications are impossible to fully appreciate. The 2020 general election could very well pit a Republican nominee who was never a Republican (Trump) against a Democratic nominee who was never a Democrat (Sanders).
With both parties buckling under the weight of extraordinary ideological and cultural pressures, and the electorate as a whole undergoing a sweeping demographic realignment, it’s not implausible to envision the post-Trump GOP splitting altogether rather than regressing to an era of paternalistic, top-down party politics. The palace gates were finally broken down by the 2016 election, with Trump’s candidacy the chosen battering ram of the populist masses. They may discover that overthrowing the monarchy didn’t bring the changes they hoped for—but that doesn’t mean they’ll reinstall a king.
“The Republican Party is on a pretty thin thread right now,” says Raúl Labrador, the former congressman and leader of the Tea Party faction that threatened to break away from the GOP in 2010. “The establishment invited this insurgency by not listening to the American people. It started during the Bush years. It got worse with Boehner. Now [Ryan]. And Trump actually spoke to those people. That’s why it’s so incumbent on him to listen to them. Because if he doesn’t, they will turn on him, too.”
What will that look like?
“Right now, they’re happy with Trump, but they’re going to grow disillusioned if they keep seeing trillions more in debt, if they don’t see the immigration problem solved, if they don’t see wages go up for everyday Americans,” Labrador warns. “I think voters will be looking for a new vehicle to keep those promises to the American people. That’s when you’re going to see a new political party. And you’ll get people from both sides—some of the Bernie Sanders people and some of the Trump people. That’s what I see coming.”
At the other end of the Republican spectrum, Sara Fagen, White House political director under Bush, offers an identical prediction.
“A lot of people think Trump is a footnote, that he’s just here for four or eight years, and then it goes back to normal. But I think that’s wrong. I think the party is changed for good,” she says. “And it won’t be sustainable. We’re in a period of incredible change as a country where the extremes of the left and right are going to converge, and you’re going to wind up with a third party. Over the next two or four years? No. But in the next twenty? For sure.”
In the interim, the jockeying to lead the post-Trump Republican Party has already begun. Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz—both seasoned, shrewd, and afflicted with the presidential bug—are charting their respective policy paths in the Senate. Nikki Haley is taking donor meetings around the country and mapping out her vision for the party. Mike Pence is waiting patiently in the wings, certain that his dutiful subservience will be rewarded. And a crop of ambitious next-generation Republicans is lurking in the shadows. All of these people are sizing up Trumpism and molding themselves to annex some part of its appeal.
They all face the same problem: There is only one Donald J. Trump.
A singular figure in the sweep of American mythology, the forty-fifth president identified a historic convergence of cultural and socioeconomic unrest and used it to remake the political landscape in his image. There can be no imitating Trump’s style or replicating his success.
Rarely has a president so thoroughly altered the identity of his party. Never has a president so ruthlessly exploited the insecurity of his people.
I WANT TO KNOW: IS HE TRANSITIONAL OR TRANSFORMATIONAL?
Trump smirks. “I mean, can there be—” he stops abruptly. “I don’t want to be saying it.”
But the president can’t help himself. “Can there be a question?” he says, pushing his chair outward and standing up, casting a shadow over the Resolute desk. “Honestly, can there be even a question?”
Acknowledgments
WHEW.
That was a bit long—shocking, no doubt, to everyone who has edited me—so I’ll try to be succinct here.
There is no way I could have written this book without the love, encouragement, and unconditional support offered by my wife, Sweta. It’s challenging enough to be a working mom with three boys under the age of five. But to carry that load alone for the better part of a year—while her absentee, first-time author husband toiled in his basement study battling anxiety and sleep deprivation—ought to qualify Sweta for some sort of humanitarian award. Naturally, she will shrug this off, her selflessness surpassed only by her humility. The world should know, however, that any praise I may receive for this project rightfully belongs to her. (Your criticisms may still be directed to me.) Sweta, you are the rock of our family, the love of my life, and, as I said on our wedding day, the headline of my heart. I treasure you.
Sitting down one night last November to begin writing, I got as far as typing “Chapter One” before spending an interminable stretch staring at the otherwise barren screen, wondering what I’d gotten myself into and whether it was yet time for a bathroom break. What spurred me to action then, and every night over the next several months, was the thought of my three sons sleeping upstairs. They were far too young—a newborn and two toddlers—to understand what their dad was doing. But they were my inspiration nonetheless. One day my little boys will be men and, like other kids coming of age in that next generation, they will be brimming with questions about this strange national legacy they inherited. My job as a journalist means nothing compared to my duties as a father; fortunately, this book provided me an occasion to wear both hats, putting on paper a decade’s worth of reporting that I hope will inform their views of politics, culture, and the human condition. Abraham, Lewis, Brooks: Thank you for clarifying my purpose. Never forget who you are and whose you are. I love the three of you so very much.