The next iteration of Donald Trump

| 7:00 pm EDT June 16, 2023
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Political pundits of all stripes have talked about a new version of Donald Trump. Conservatives have sometimes embraced the label of being “Trump before Trump,” while both moderates and progressives fear that someday a smart and competent Trump will appear – who is more calculating in the damage that they do, while rapidly consolidating their power.

I don’t necessarily share that fear – for the reason that conservatives aren’t really drawn to smart people who understand how politics works – since they don’t really believe in actual democracy, so much as being ruled by someone who shares in hating the same people they hate.

For some time, the media propped up that new version as Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida whose scandals they often glossed over so he’d have a shot at the 2024 nomination. DeSantis still managed to fail embarrassingly in the primaries while making clear that he has no ability to govern. While inflation has fallen to 4% around the country, it’s more than twice that in Florida, since DeSantis passed a massive $1 billion tax cut for his donors.

It’s likely to get even worse now that he signed an anti-immigration bill that could kill off 100,000 jobs in the state. This is a reminder that whoever the standard bearer is for the GOP in 2024, their policies are still awful and cause suffering wherever they’re implemented – and these policies only attract awful people who seek power. That’s why we need to elect Democrats up and down the ballot in 2023 and 2024, and for the rest of the foreseeable future.