The Donald Trump albatross around their necks
Donald Trump is still popular with his own base (or maybe not so much, considering how badly his 2024 donations have fallen off). He’s less popular within the Republican primary voting base, where polls suggest that roughly half of primary voters want someone else as their nominee. Trump is exceedingly unpopular with the general public.
To that end, Trump is going to be an albatross around the neck of every House Republican running in a competitive district in 2024, whether Trump manages to score the nomination on his way to prison or not. To give you an idea of just how badly Trump is going to hurt Republicans’ chances in competitive districts, check this out:
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Nice work @BoldProgressive
“In California’s 45th Congressional District, along Western Avenue in Buena Park, a giant billboard is set to display a photograph of Representative Michelle Steel next to former President Donald J. Trump and Representative Jim Jordan, the Republican…
— Rachel Bitecofer 🗽🦆 (@RachelBitecofer) October 18, 2023
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That’s right, Democratic Party-leaning groups are now just straight up putting the pictures of House Republicans next to the faces of Donald Trump and Jim Jordan on billboards. House Republican Michelle Steel is running for reelection in a moderate district that actually leans two points Democratic, and her race is rated a competitive “Lean Republican” by Cook Political.
We expect that races like this one may find their way into the “toss up” category before much longer, given how badly the likes of Trump and Jordan are going to weigh down candidates like Steel. These are the competitive House districts that we’re going to flip in 2024, and hand the House majority to the Democrats in the process.
Bill Palmer is the publisher of the political news outlet Palmer Report