Is GOP populism a person or a movement?

Trump thinks it's a person, and he may well be right.

Former GOP congressman Thaddeus McCotter, writing in American Greatness, tackles the question of whether Republican populism is a person or a movement. He contends it’s a movement.

McCotter hopes so, anyway. He warns:

If. . .the primary consideration becomes one of personalities rather than principles – in sum, being concerned more about a person than the movement – Republican populist principles will last only as long as the nominee’s political viability and ultimately will be tied in the electorate’s mind with a man rather than a movement.

Republican populist principles will be tainted by the real or imagined political foibles of the nominee, especially if their political viability ends disastrously and the movement’s bloody carcass will be preyed upon by its enemies on the Left and in the GOP establishment.

Should this prove the case in 2024, the Left will win and their regressive march toward autocratic collectivization will proceed unimpeded, as the Republican populist movement will be crushed beneath the weight of a defeated nominee.

McCotter isn’t writing in the abstract. He points out that “the Left has taken it upon itself to change the political rules and ‘norms’ [by arguing that] not only is Donald Trump a racist, fascist, homophobic, domestic terrorist wannabe, etc., so are his supporters – i.e., the GOP.” “It is imperative,” he adds, “for Republican populists not to take their bait by equally conflating a person for our party.”

McCotter continues:

While parties are often considered a reflection of their standard bearer, the opposite is also true. There must be a reciprocity between the nominee and the party faithful.

Having chosen the nominee, they must stand with the nominee when the going gets ugly and not cut and run. But. . .the nominee has a responsibility to refrain from making things uglier and impulsively becoming an impediment to the democratic acceptance by the electorate of their principles and policies.

I agree with all of the above. However, McCotter’s conclusion is subject to doubt:

Whoever [Republican primary voters] choose, one should trust their decision will be made not upon personalities, but upon Republican populist movement’s principles and their perpetuation.

What basis is there for such optimism? It seems to me that Trump’s personality has been at least as important in explaining his appeal as the policies he advocates. (See below for more on this.)

There’s an obvious cult of personality component to his political success. Trump understands this and always has. Recall his comment in January 2016 that “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose any voters, OK. It's, like, incredible."

Yes it is.

As a companion to McCotter’s article, I recommend this less optimistic analysis by John Ellis. He writes:

The reason Trump’s support has never wavered since he lost the 2020 presidential election is that his support in rural and exurban America has never wavered. Indictments have been handed down, allegations of wrong-doing have surfaced (a lot of them), countless crazy rants have been posted (by Trump) on social media in the wee hours, Trump-endorsed candidates have lost key races…….you know the litany. It goes on and on (and on).

Through it all, Trump’s Jacksonian, rural-exurban base has remained loyal. And the more Trump comes under attack, be it from the mainstream media or the Biden Justice Department, Ron DeSantis or Chris Christie, the stronger that loyalty holds fast. Each and every attacker is running headlong into a central tenet of Jacksonian America, which says you never cut and run on one of your own.

(Emphasis added)

It’s no use disputing that Trump is genuinely “one of their own.” That’s the perception, and it’s the perception that matters.

But Ellis rejects the view that Trump is therefore the inevitable nominee:

To be clear, Trump’s “base” is not wedded to Trump. Like every other “voting bloc,” it is open to suggestions. And it’s as transactional and pragmatic as the next constituency. Take away their Social Security and Medicare and watch your poll numbers collapse. But beneath their transactional concerns lies a code, which compels certain behaviors. And the most important of those “behaviors” are loyalty and respect.

Trump voters won’t consent to his political funeral until they hear the eulogy first. This seems obvious on its face but it’s remarkable (if not amazing) that Trump’s opponents don’t seem to understand that the first step toward defeating Trump is to honor him. Asserting that Trump is some kind of transexual pervert enabler, as a DeSantis video recently did, is so unbelievably stupid it takes your breath away.

But how does a Trump rival “eulogize” the former president while making the case that he/she, not Trump, should be the nominee? By arguing that Trump carries too much baggage — including his legal difficulties — to defeat Joe Biden? That’s a difficult case to make when Trump is competitive (or better) with Biden in the polls.

More fundamentally, pointing to Trump’s baggage, even indirectly, is likely to alienate his base, not win it over. This approach smacks of asking the base to “cut and run” from Trump because his enemies have demonized and indicted him. That’s not something “Jacksonians” are likely to do.

The alternative is to (1) praise Trump for the issues he moved to the forefront and, in some cases, for making some progress on these fronts, but at the same time (2) point to his lack of follow through in key areas — e.g., China, the wall, “draining the swamp” — and, in the case of the covid response, his ceding of responsibility to others, including Dr. Fauci.

Will this approach carry the day? If GOP populism is a movement not a person, it might well succeed. But as I said, there’s reason to think it’s more a person than a movement.