Even with those positive vibes, there remains drama within the party. Landslide wins down ballot may not be the best thing for a Trump White House, some say.
The latest numbers at RealClearPolling show Trump, who outperformed polling in his two previous campaigns, in a virtual tie with Harris, the result of a steady rise for Trump since early August.
Electoral College vote projections show Trump with slight leads in battleground states Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan and Nevada. The leads range from 0.2% in Michigan and Wisconsin to 2.2% in Georgia.
The Trump Train may be building steam, but it hasn’t left the station, some veteran conservative media analysts say.
Iowa-based Blaze Media host Steve Deace is taking a Missouri-like “show me” approach to the current climate. Deace, recalling stories from the 2022 mid-terms and the Joe Biden-Trump match in 2020, referenced the “machinery” of the Democratic Party on American Family Radio Friday.
“I need to see us beat it before I fully believe it will happen,” he told show host Jenna Ellis.
Still, Deace remains optimistic, encouraged by reports of Republican performance in early voting.
“Even if we are cannibalizing our own vote, it at least means that our people are energized; and our floor is higher than I feared a month ago. I actually think for the first time Republicans sweeping everything is a legitimate outcome. I think 52 senators will be the low end of what Republicans end up with, the basement. I think Republicans retaining [the House] is at least 50-50, and I would not have said that a month ago,” he admitted.
Much of Deace’s optimism comes from his take on reports of early voting.
“I did have a little birdy share with me, some strong analysis, in a key battleground state that Trump lost in 2020, and even with the overall [turnout] sample to be plus-11 women, overall Republicans are plus-5 in that same state. We don’t know how each of those people voted, the crossover, but if it’s anywhere close to that when the men show up on Election Day …”
Harris isn’t going quietly and is especially turning up the heat on black men, a category in which she’s running about 20% behind a number of recent Democratic candidates.
“We’re seeing more pandering from Kamala Harris,” Gerard Filitti, senior counsel with The Lawfare Project, told Ellis. “She’s making general policy pronouncements but making it look like she’s doing it specifically for black men.”
Targeting black men could backfire for Harris
One of Harris’ positions – loan forgiveness – creates constitutional problems, Filitti argued.
“We've seen the way the Supreme Court has gone in recent years, and it's gone away from Affirmative Action. It's gone away from race-based decisions or race-based judgments on government policy. So, it's really on iffy constitutional grounds whether she could do something like this to begin with," the attorney said. "The mere fact that she wants to offer loan forgiveness in broad terms is problematic when you target it by race or ethnicity.”
However, a GOP sweep, if it happens, could bring its own challenges. For Trump to govern after a victory, Deace said, the former president needs to have a clear agenda and stay on message and on task – or he needs to win by a smaller margin than the big win some are predicting.
As the Blaze Media host points out, Trump – overwhelmingly – won the support of Republicans in the primary … but he hasn’t won the hearts of the traditional Republicans on Capitol Hill.
“We are in a coalition with people who do not share our value system. We often jump to the conclusion that they share the other side’s, but we are largely united by a common opposition. We don’t want America to become communist,” he explained.
Establishment Republicans are in the uncomfortable position of cheering for the team – but with limits. "Win, but don’t dominate" is the frame of mind for many, Deace says.
“I don’t believe that most Republicans, even the terrible ones, want Trump to lose. But I do know this: They don’t want Trump to win in the way it appears he may win.”
That’s because Trump didn’t play the game, according to Deace.
The only living former Republican president other than Trump – George W. Bush, who at 78 is Trump’s age – did not attend the party's nominating convention. Trump went outside the party to build a coalition, bringing former Democrats Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Tusli Gabbard onto the stage.
“There are swampy Republicans who feel greatly threatened by that,” Deace noted. “They’ll do whatever they can to undermine the ability of these people to come into the Republican Party and overwhelm them and remove them in the primaries.”
A slim Senate majority could be a plus
Republicans look poised to claim the Senate, but Deace warned that Trump should be on guard for certain Republicans like Susan Collins of Maine, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and John Kennedy of Louisiana. There are others too.
Kennedy’s “voting record is awful,” Deace said, “but he figured out from Lindsey Graham and mastered the art of getting on Fox News and dropping some quips. These guys have figured out that if they drop some folksy lines with a Southern accent, people will believe [based on viral clips that] they're part of a conservative movement ….”
If the Republicans win the Senate but by a slim majority – similar to the advantage the party has in the House now – it creates pressure on individual senators to work for party unity, Deace said.
“One of the problems is if the Senate has too big of a majority. We are seeing Trump pull ahead of the Republican Party,” Deace said.
