What comes next for the GOP?
What comes next for the GOP?
P resident Donald Trump has sunk the GOP again. He did it in 2018, when the party lost the House, and in 2022, when a promised red wave fizzled. He did it again in the Georgia runoffs of January 2021, which cost the party the Senate. On Tuesday, Democrats took both chambers of Congress, riding a huge anti-Trump blue-nami.
The president’s rock-bottom approval ratings were the anchor that sank many good GOP candidates this week. Reuters/Ipsos recorded his approval at a record low of 31 percent in mid-October, the lowest of any president on record in a midterm election year, and his long-winded, meandering speeches in deep-red states in the last month of the campaign only highlighted the GOP’s Trump problem.
Consider what Republicans could have campaigned on. They had a border that was demonstrably more secure, a tax law that locked in 2017 gains, and a business-friendly regulatory climate that helped create a vibrant economy. These are real achievements, and conservatives should be proud of them. But they only matter if voters hear about them, and the president’s priorities ensured that the national conversation leading up to the election was about other things.
Two years ago, Trump campaigned on bringing costs down. Instead, the voters who handed him a second term watched tariffs (which are another form of taxes) and an ill-planned war in Iran inflate the cost of everything from groceries to gas. Trump then brazenly said he did not care about rising prices. Voters took note.
Then there is the Trump style of governance, which has always been widely disliked but that his most devoted supporters insist does not matter. It matters. Most Americans are not ideologues; they are normal people who want the government to function and the news to be boring. Instead, they got shutdown brinkmanship, presidential bombast, executive actions announced by social media post, forever wars, and support of murderous dictators like Vladimir Putin over democratic allies like Ukraine. Trump’s tendency to turn policy disputes into bitter personal feuds did not help. Many conservatives recoil from Trump’s chaotic government and tendency to do whatever is best financially for the Trump family.
The White House also made a cynical bet that the electorate could be bought. In September, Trump promised $5,000 to every American adult if Republicans won both chambers. Set aside the fiscal absurdity of promising checks to cure an inflation problem that borrowed money helps cause. The pitch tells you what the White House thinks of voters: They are customers to be bribed, not citizens to be persuaded.
Speaking of bribes, voters of both parties took offense at the overwhelming stench of corruption coming from the White House. Ambassadors demanding $100,000 payments. The president’s son getting a Russian oligarch to pay for his wedding celebrations. A MAGA insider reaping a $50 million contract for getting her foreign client a Trump pardon. The list goes on and on; its stench became impossible to ignore.
Then there were the stupid strategic blunders. Look no further than my home state of Texas, where an honorable and popular senator, John Cornyn, was derailed in the primary by an indicted felon who was impeached in the Texas House by his own party. Ken Paxton’s only claim to fame was being a hardcore MAGA Trump acolyte. Trump loves those who kiss his ring, and his full-throated endorsement of Paxton turned an all-but-certain Texas Senate reelection into a blowout loss that doomed many other good Texas GOP candidates. Trump’s gut instinct led him to back one of the most corrupt politicians in Texas history over the strong objections of virtually every GOP senator and leading Texas Republican. Stupidity and arrogance proved to be a fatal combination.
In the end, virtually all strongly pro-MAGA candidates lost, even in red states like Ohio (goodbye, Vivek), South Carolina (sorry, Lindsey), and Georgia (should have listened to Kemp). Many of the most pro-MAGA House members (alleged domestic abuser Max Miller, January 6 leader Scott Perry, and ever-Trumper Lauren Boebert) all lost in red districts. Voters just put a gigantic exclamation point on the end of the Trump era.
So, what happens now? Trump and his sycophants will blame the candidates, the media, redistricting, anything but himself. Indeed, Trump posted on Truth Social on Election Night that he would have won in a “landslide” if he had been on the ballot. So typical. Back in the real world, Tuesday’s results leave Republicans facing a decision we cannot put off, and it will shape the 2028 race starting today.
One path is more of the same: tariffs, inflation, and expanding deficits as permanent features of economic policy, governance by grievance and social media posts, and a party that exists mainly to serve oligarchs and demagogues. MAGA does have a loyal, if shrinking, base and an ability to win primaries. But it has now lost the House and Senate with a president whose approval sits in the low thirties. That is not a foundation for winning a general election in two years, and the voters have clearly said so.
The other path is a return to what made the Republican Party a governing force for decades: low taxes and restraint on spending, free trade that lowers prices rather than raises them, a federal government that does fewer things better, and a national defense strong enough to deter adversaries without having to go to war. None of this is exotic. It is the platform that won the Cold War, built our postwar prosperity, and repeatedly gave Americans a reason to trust the Republican Party. It is also, not incidentally, what voters seem to want when they complain about the cost of groceries and the state of the world.
The 2028 primaries will reveal which path the Republican Party chooses. A candidate who can credibly run as a traditional conservative, one who defends free markets, free trade, a smaller but more effective government, and a strong foreign policy — without all the chaos — will find an electorate that is hungry for exactly that. Mike Pence, Brian Kemp, Michael McCaul, and Glenn Younkin: take note. Trump uber-loyalists like Vice President JD Vance now have a much tougher path.
The genuine cost of Tuesday’s election is that Trump has once again taken a favorable set of conservative ideas and attached them to a political brand that the large majority of voters firmly reject. Limited government, secure borders, strong national defense, and economic growth are not losing ideas in general. They are losing right now because of who is carrying them. MAGA loyalists can keep pretending otherwise and continue to lose. Voters, as usual, have the last word. The GOP must now decide if it wants to be a permanent MAGA minority party or a big-tent conservative governing coalition in the style of Ronald Reagan.