Published September 14, 2022
New Hampshire’s Republican primary on Tuesday confirmed the trend we have seen all year long: the narrow dominance of populist, MAGA elements within the GOP. That fact demonstrates that only one Republican could deny Donald Trump the party’s 2024 presidential nomination: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Granite State voters had a variety of options to choose from, with strong, establishment-backed conservatives running in races for the state’s Senate seat and both House seats. In all three cases, Republicans chose the Trumpiest candidate. None had the former president’s blessing, but all nonetheless carried his implicit imprimatur as they faithfully imitated his angry style and embraced his views on issues from immigration to election denialism. The verdict, as disappointing as it is to the party establishment, merely echoes similar decisions by voters across the nation.
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Henry Olsen, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, studies and provides commentary on American politics. His work focuses on how America’s political order is being upended by populist challenges, from the left and the right. He also studies populism’s impact in other democracies in the developed world.
Image from Gage Skidmore on Wikimedia via Creative Commons 2.0
