Donald Trump fails to land his big distraction from indictment
I’ve talked a fair amount about how certain political rituals are widely seen as being important and influential, simply because the media and pundit class has spent years telling us that these certain political rituals are important and influential, meaning candidates have to pretend to treat these events as if they’re important and influential, even though these events never seem to have any impact by the time the smoke clears. This brings us to the far right CPAC conference, which never seems to have any real impact – even on the Republican primary race – and this year wasn’t really any different.
CPAC was different this year in the sense that half the projected Republican 2024 presidential candidates skipped it. Donald Trump is still running a phantom campaign to distract from his criminal indictments and help fund his defense at trial. And as long as Trump is still carrying out this ruse, some of the actual 2024 Republican candidates are trying to stay out of his way for fear of becoming his primary target. Sure, they used the CPAC founder’s personal scandals as a de facto excuse to stay away, but since when has any Republican politician cared about that kind of thing? We all know that the likes of Ron DeSantis and Mike Pence were dodging Trump.
To that end, it’s not a big surprise that CPAC attendance – at least during the keynote speeches – appeared to be way down this year. Trump and his remaining cheerleaders were the only draw, and as we keep seeing of late, they’re not much of a draw anymore. Even a right winger who’s focused on 2024 isn’t going to be particularly interested in sitting there listening to Trump and his remaining pals going on and on about how 2020 was supposedly rigged. That doesn’t in any way help the Republican Party’s 2024 prospects.
Since Trump’s remaining supporters seemed to be the only ones who showed up, it’s not surprising that he won the 2024 straw poll by a big margin. This was one step away from polling folks at a Trump rally to see who they support. If anything, the fact that multiple big name Republican candidates now feel comfortable skipping this event is just evidence that it never had much influence on the Republican primary race to begin with. The only reason to attend was so the media wouldn’t keep asking why you didn’t attend.
But in spite of the seeming total lack of impact that CPAC’s big speeches had this week, they nonetheless dominated the media sphere. This kind of thing may not have any real world impact, but it sure is good for short term ratings.
In reality, Donald Trump used CPAC to give the same limp speech that he’s been periodically giving for two years, liberal media pundits used it as yet another opportunity to chase retweets by yelling “oh my god we’re really doomed this time,” and that was the end of it. Within a few days no one in the media and pundit sphere will still be talking about what happened at this event, because nothing actually happened.
We see a similar pattern at the end of other media-blessed events like the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary. We have to listen to weeks if not months of media and pundit chatter about how these events are going to be crucial in determining the next presidential nominees. In the moment, the results are held up as the most important thing in the world. And then as soon as it’s over, everyone sort of remembers that it didn’t really impact anything in the real world.
With Trump’s irrelevant political speech now over, with no actual impact, the focus will quickly shift back to the real story: Trump is on the verge of criminal indictment in multiple jurisdictions. No speech can change that. No amount of media hype for his supposed 2024 campaign can keep him from the arrest, bail and travel restrictions, trial dates, convictions, and prison sentences that now actually define his life.
