The Republican Party's Future

What is the future of the Republican Party?

Before I begin, you should know I don’t have the best record of political prognostication.  I’ve been a progressive so long that, until recently, I just didn’t understand much of the rest of the country:

• In the 1968 presidential election, I thought there was no chance that Republican Richard Nixon would beat Humbert Humphrey.  Humphrey got trounced.
• In 1980, I was delighted when the Republican Party nominated Ronald Reagan because I was sure he couldn’t win against Jimmy Carter.  Carter was clobbered 489-49 in the Electoral College.
• Even in 1984, I was sure Reagan could not win re-election.  Reagan crushed Democrat Walter Mondale with the highest electoral vote total (525) in American history.
• And in 2016, when the Republican Party nominated Donald … Well; I don’t need to get into that one. 
  

Furthermore, I’m not sure I’ve escaped the progressive cocoon.

But somebody has to begin thinking about the future of the Republican Party, and I’m not going to let my lousy record of predictions stand in my way. 

There are four possibilities.

1. The Republican Party could continue its populist, anti-democratic rightward swing. 

It could take hold of Congress in 2022, renominate Trump or an acolyte in 2024 and move us more deeply into the authoritarianism we have so narrowly avoided.   

A sign of their political power, even after four years of the Trump administration, Republicans held onto all of the statehouses up for re-election in 2020, hardly a sign that the party is losing clout.  They now have a 20-18 state-house advantage over the Democrats, which is likely to lead to extreme gerrymandering, voter suppression, and even partisan control of the voting process.  Remember, within narrow constitutional limits, the Supreme Court seems to have decided that states may determine the distribution of their electoral votes however they choose. 

In addition, the Democrats’ narrow control of Congress will be threatened in 2022 because the president’s party usually loses congressional seats in mid-term elections.

Although the Republican Party is unlikely to win a national popular vote for a while, an electoral vote victory in the 2024 presidential election is quite possible.

2. The Republican Party could self-destruct.  

 

The majority of congressional Republicans seem committed to the “Big Lie” of Trump’s victory in 2020.  A significant number seem still committed to an anti-mask, “personal choice” approach to the pandemic.  A smaller, although rapidly declining, number remain anti-vax as well.  With time it’s likely a large number of people will understand the madness of those positions, which may well haunt Republicans in the 2022 and 2024 elections. 

 

Since last year’s election, the party seems to have made little effort to broaden its base and has instead alienated the country’s moderates.  Those moderates seem increasingly turned off by the Republican attempt to suppress the vote and radically gerrymander the states.  Ultimately the Republican Party cannot maintain itself by appealing only to its base, perhaps 40% of the electorate.    

 

A small number of moderate Republican politicians seem to have understood the damage the party is doing to the country. Although unlikely, it’s possible they will decide they cannot continue with the madness.  It would not take many Mitt Romneys, Susan Collinses, or Adam Kinzingers to convince many Republican voters to temporarily support Democratic candidates while they build a new conservative party.  As I wrote in a previous post, it has happened before.

 

3. Perhaps the least likely future 

for the Republicans is a return to a moderate conservative party. that could take part in a sustained bipartisanship.  The vast majority of the party’s political leaders either actively support Trump or more passively fear him so it’s hard to see how the party could gradually return to its roots, even after Trump disappears or is pushed from the scene.

 

4. The most likely Republican future

is that the 2022 mid-term elections will lead to political stasis.  Republicans will probably take over at least one house of Congress, leading to the national political paralysis so well known to the country.  An incapacitated national government serves the Republican Party’s goals by blocking meaningful legislation to act on the major problems facing the country, leaving the states more power.  More importantly, it leads to a decrease in confidence in the national government which deepens the populist, authoritarian impulses of the country.

Even if this happens, however, I cannot imagine the stalemate lasting indefinitely.   It is simply too unstable.  Either of the first two options — the eventual destruction of the Republican Party or an authoritarian take-over — seems far more likely.

While it has been coming on for several decades, the 2016 ascension of Donald Trump and his take-over of the Republican Party marks a turning point in the history of the American democracy.  How we turn matters a great deal!