Eight years ago, voters anticipated a rematch between the two dynasties that had defined Republican and Democratic politics since the 1990s, with Jeb Bush as the GOP presidential front-runner and Hillary Clinton as the inevitable Democratic candidate. However, Donald Trump emerged and changed the game.
Now, there is the possibility of another rematch between Trump and Joe Biden, and both men are determined to make it happen.
Biden altered his schedule to prioritize South Carolina, the state critical to his 2020 nomination, while Trump has been campaigning since the 2018 midterms and attacking potential Republican challengers for the nomination, particularly Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
The Democrats lack anyone who can realistically take the nomination from the 80-year-old incumbent. Despite anaemic approval ratings, Biden is confident that the electoral map of 2024 will return him to office.
Trump and DeSantis need to win industrial Middle America to overcome Biden, as these states delivered the White House to Trump in 2016 and took it from him in 2020.
A Republican candidate has to win back the Rust Belt or expand the battleground map to win next year.
While Trump’s map remains the best one for the GOP, it became Biden’s in 2020. DeSantis has the best chance of preventing a 2024 do-over, but he trails Trump in recent polls.
DeSantis has to prove his appeal to states that supported Democrats in 2020, but he has momentum after his 20-point reelection victory over Charlie Crist and the possibility of doing well in caucus states. Trump has already attacked DeSantis, and the primary fight between them would be brutal.
Winning against Trump but losing to Biden would put DeSantis at risk of being hated by Trump’s most ardent supporters and seen as a loser by Republican pragmatists.
If 2024 is a Biden-Trump rematch, DeSantis’ term as governor ends in early 2027, an optimal time to mount a presidential campaign for the following year. However, DeSantis’ supporters want him to run now, fearing Trump’s electability and desiring the governor’s disciplined conservatism.
This sets the GOP on course for a bloody primary season, but both Trump and DeSantis need to remember that beating Biden requires winning industrial Middle America.
»Possibility of another rematch between Trump and Joe Biden«
↯↯↯Read More On The Topic On TDPel Media ↯↯↯