TRUMP’S talk of 2024 puts field in a bind.

WASHINGTON — When a party loses the White House, a new crop of presidential hopefuls typically begin moving quickly to lay the groundwork for a run in the next campaign. Not this year. President Donald Trump’s increasingly overt flirtations with running again in 2024 are freezing the potentially vast field of Republican candidates. GOP White House hopefuls are essentially left to watch what Trump does next instead of courting fundraisers, building networks and visiting early-voting states — the usual campaign planning steps — for fear of angering Trump and risking turning off his large and loyal base.

But strategists say Trump is essentially leaving the party in a holding pattern, with could-be-candidates unable to prepare as they try to avoid crossing a notoriously unforgiving president.

In a normal campaign cycle, “you would see potential presidential candidates in Iowa and New Hampshire this month,” said Alex Conant, a Republican operative who served as communications director to Florida Sen. Marco Rubio’s 2016 presidential campaign. This year, “that’s not going to happen because nobody wants to be seen as challenging Trump.”

Grover Cleveland was the last — and so far only — president to win the White House after being defeated for reelection, and that was more than a century ago. Tump’s vocal desire to follow that path are particularly problematic for officials considered among the likely contenders, including Vice President Mike Pence, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Trump’s former ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley. But they also affect the long list of other Republicans who would need to win over large swaths of Trump’s base to capture the GOP nomination. That includes Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas, Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Rick Scott of Florida. Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, who is also seen as a potential candidate, has already said he will support Trump if he runs again.

“The reality is they all need to go along with it because they know if it’s in two years or six years, whenever they look at running again, the absolute worst thing you can be among primary voters in against Donald Trump,” said Brendan Buck, a Republican strategist who worked for the last two Republican speakers of the House.

One person who could benefit from Trump’s maneuvering is Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, a Republican who has emerged as one of Trump’s fiercest critics during the coronavirus pandemic. His supporters argue that if Trump did run, Hogan would enjoy a near-open lane unlike the one crowded with Trump defenders.

Some Republicans believe the president’s freeze is a good thing, staving off internal fighting among the many contenders who had been expected to consider running.

There’s also skepticism that Trump, who toyed with running numerous times before 2016, will go through with another campaign. But he has already raised more than $200 million since his Election Day defeat, with a chunk of that money going to his new political committee, thanks to an endless stream of solicitations requesting contributions for an “election defense fund.”

“His agenda is to use these recounts and lawsuits to raise money, to have money to freeze the field in 2024 and to be an effective surrogate and spreader of money in 2022,” said GOP donor Dan Eberhart.

For now, the 2024 prospects are largely keeping their heads down. But the lack of overt jockeying to date has dumbfounded Trump critics.

“This is when people should be jumping in the ring, fighting against him, making the argument that it’s time for the party to move away from him,” said Jennifer Horn, the former chair of the New Hampshire Republican Party. “If they are scared off by Donald Trump’s bluster at this stage in the game after seeing the way that he lost, then they should not even be thinking of running.”