If You Can’t Beat Him...
DeSantis’ Trump nod & the GOP
EVEN in a political landscape largely defined by its participants’ cowardice, the recent spate of endorsements prominent elected Republicans have bestowed upon Donald Trump stands out as both a cause and symptom of what ails the GOP.
And among those endorsements, the one Ron DeSantis offered after he announced the suspension of his presidential campaign Sunday is especially notable for what it said about the state of the GOP.
“It’s clear to me that a majority of Republican primary voters want to give Donald Trump another chance,” noted DeSantis in his farewell to supporters.
“He has my endorsement because we can’t go back to the old Republican guard of yesteryear — a repackaged form of warmed-over corporatism — that Nikki Haley represents,” he concluded.
It was by far the worst moment of his political career.
Much scorn has been heaped on DeSantis for not fulfilling his campaign’s promise.
A year ago, he was well-positioned to defeat Trump and restore Republicans’ hopes of both defeating President Biden and installing a responsible, competent conservative leader in his stead.
His failure to gain traction in the primary represented a political failure, but one he could reasonably attribute to events beyond his control.
The decision to return to Trump on bended knee after spending the last year being the principal target of his deranged outbursts, however, was entirely his own.
Of course, DeSantis is not the first and will not be the last to kiss the ring.
Sens. Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz and Tim Scott all put their finger to the wind and re-hitched their wagons to Trump after his runaway Iowa caucuses victory last week.
Rubio cited the Child Tax Credit expansion and sanctions on the Venezuelan government under Trump’s administration — two policies with broad support among Republicans — in giving the former president his support.
Cruz explained his endorsement by declaring the GOP primary was “over” after Trump’s Iowa victory.
But Sen. J.D. Vance — an early endorser of Trump’s third campaign for the White House — was most honest about why so many of his colleagues are joining him in this twisted game of follow-the-leader.
In a post-Iowa message to DeSanVance tis, Vance declared, “Desantjs [sic ]is a very good governor, and he’ll have a bright future if he recognizes what many of us recognized months ago: Trump will be our nominee and the most useful thing all of us can do is focus on beating Joe Biden.”
Translation: “If you continue to defy Trump, your record as a conservative stalwart in office will all be for naught. People like me are here to make sure of it.”
And: “If you acquiesce, perhaps there’s hope for you yet.”
Whatever his flaws, Vance is to be admired for his relatively open cynicism, if for no other reason than the insight it lends into the average Republican’s political decision-making process.
Recall that not two years ago, the “Hillbilly Elegy “author was struggling to keep his head above water in Ohio’s Republican Senate primary. With just a couple weeks to go, Vance was stuck in a distant third in the polls.
His message — and he himself — did not resonate with the electorate.
But Vance’s behavior wasn’t designed to appeal to Ohio voters; it had been crafted to charm a single Florida Man.
It worked: Trump endorsed on April 15, 2022.
On that date, Vance was averaging just 10.5% in the polls after spending nine and a half months on the campaign trail.
On May 3, Vance won the Republican nomination with 32.2% of the vote.
Trump celebrated Vance’s submissive entreaties to him at a September 2022 rally. “J.D. is kissing my a–,” he announced proudly, pointing at the candidate to the delight of the laughing crowd.
“Yeah, he said some bad things about me, but that was before he knew me and then he fell in love.”
Even as many distanced themselves from Trump after the 2022 midterms, Vance doubled down on his tried-and-true strategy, endorsing the man he had once derided as “noxious” and “reprehensible” for a second term.
One year later, with Trump resurgent, Vance’s decision to dance with the one who brought him looks brilliant, at least from the Machiavellian, instrumentalist perspective with which both master and apprentice approach politics.
Where some of us see a toxic blending of ambition with pusillanimity, politicians see a model to follow.
What’s clear after Sunday is Ron DeSantis lacked the conviction that would have been necessary to prevail against Trump.
The best that can be said for him is he’s made the same choice most Republicans have, willingly submitting to Trump’s leash in exchange for the fleeting illusion of influence he affords them in return.