The race for the Republican presidential nomination

Presidential primary season is set to begin.

But with former President Donald Trump holding commanding leads in the GOP contest, is the race already over?

"It's quite clear that Trump is trying to lock down the nomination before he gets convicted of anything," Jess Bidgood says.

"His opponents who are really trailing him in the polls have an incentive to stick it out that they wouldn't normally have."

So what is the narrow path to victory for Nikki Haley – or some other Republican not named Trump?

Today, On Point: The race for the Republican presidential nomination.

Whit Ayres, president of North Star Opinion Research, a GOP polling firm based in Alexandria, VA.

Tim Miller, writer-at-large for The Bulwark. Former communications director for Jeb Bush 2016. Author of "Why We Did It: A Travelogue from the Republican Road to Hell."

Jess Bidgood, senior national political reporter for the Boston Globe.

Part I

ANTHONY BROOKS: Ready or not, the 2024 presidential election season is about to kick off in earnest. Next Monday, the Republican presidential candidates face off in the Iowa caucuses. And then eight days later, they'll compete in the New Hampshire primary.

Despite his deep legal jeopardy, 91 felony counts across four different cases that could land him in jail, former president Donald Trump remains the dominant force in the GOP and holds a big lead in the race to take on Joe Biden in November. So is this contest already over? Very possibly, but some Republican strategists say there's a real, if narrow path for someone like Nikki Haley to secure the nomination, and we're going to hear from one of them in a few minutes.

But let's begin with just where the race stands, less than a week away from the Iowa caucuses. Joining us is Jess Bidgood. She's senior national political reporter for the Boston Globe. And Jess, welcome back to On Point.

Great to have you.

JESS BIDGOOD: Hi, Anthony.

BROOKS: Hi there. So Iowa caucuses come first, but I want to start with you in New Hampshire because the Boston Globe has a new poll that's just been published. It did it with Suffolk University. And again, at the risk of repeating a tired narrative in this campaign season, the former president, the poll looks pretty good for Trump among New Hampshire Republicans.

Give us some of the top lines from this poll. What stands out to you?

BIDGOOD: Absolutely. So the latest poll from the Boston Globe and Suffolk University and USA Today, we've found that Haley has either leveled off or her support has cooled in recent weeks. This poll finds her down 20 points to Trump, 46% points to 26% points.

And that's from a poll that was conducted just last week from January 3rd to January 7th.

BROOKS: Two weeks before the New Hampshire primary, Trump holds a nearly 20% lead over Nikki Haley. There was also some interesting news for Democrats and President Biden.

Democrats have been wringing their hands a little bit about low poll numbers for Biden. We're going to focus mainly on the Republicans in this hour. But while I have you, about this poll, give us that top line about President Biden.

BIDGOOD: Absolutely. So the poll found what Democrats may find to be heartening news, they found Biden with a lead over Trump in New Hampshire which is something that Democrats want to see.

There's been a lot of hand wringing and worry about Trump's strong poll numbers in swing states. And New Hampshire is perennially a very close swing state. And this poll finds Biden looking better than some might've expected.

BROOKS: So let's return to Republican Nikki Haley.

She's been surging of late. She's moved into second place in New Hampshire. And when some Republicans, and we'll hear from one later on this hour, say there is a narrow path from her, for her to secure the nomination. What's your view on that? Is this race done? Does Nikki Haley have a chance? How do you look at this, Jess?

BIDGOOD: I think it's possible for someone like Nikki Haley to have a chance, but I do think that we will know fairly quickly within the next couple of weeks how real that chance is.

We have seen a fairly static state of the race for months, particularly in Iowa, where you see Trump over 50% in polling averages right now, and having more than a 30-percentage point lead over DeSantis, his nearest competitor. New Hampshire, on the other hand, is a place where you see an actual surge taking place, if you look over the past months, and that's from Haley.

It's a reminder that a small and more politically moderate state like New Hampshire really can matter, really can be a place where a candidate breaks out, shows some movement. But the question for her is going to be what happens next? Because a poor showing in her home state of South Carolina, which is a little further down the timeline, further down the map. That would blunt her momentum.

And right now, Trump currently has, is almost 30 percentage points ahead of her.

BROOKS: In her home state in South Carolina.

BIDGOOD: Yeah, absolutely. So if Haley can show up, post a really strong showing in Iowa. Come in second and then post a very strong showing in New Hampshire. That would be a way for her to claim momentum, go into South Carolina with the wind at her back.

But if that doesn't happen, it's going to be really hard to see how anybody breaks away from Trump.

BROOKS: Right. I want to mention. I was really grateful to see this glow this poll in the Boston Globe and your paper done with Suffolk University. A CNN/University of New Hampshire poll also released today shows that Haley has a more narrow gap with the former president.

They show a seven-point gap. And that poll seems to suggest that she's continuing to peak a little bit. So I just wanted to put that out there, because polls are often, obviously they're not predictive. They're just moments in time, and they don't always agree. But still, we've seen this surge that Nikki Haley has been enjoying.

What are you seeing on the ground from folks that you talk to in New Hampshire at Nikki Haley events? I know she's had the support of the governor, popular governor, Chris Sununu in New Hampshire. What are you hearing from voters about her?

BIDGOOD: So when I go to Nikki Haley events, I meet a lot of voters who are, they view her as a real breath of fresh air.

They see a candidate who they recognize as presidential, who they see as restrained. And they, in some cases, I speak with people who voted for Trump in 2016 and then voted for Biden in 2020, got sick of Trump, really giving Nikki Haley a close look. And excited about her candidacy. But at the same time, as scrutiny has increased of Nikki Haley, she's had some wobbles.

She made a comment earlier this week. Or maybe it was last week. I'm starting to lose track of the days. Suggesting that New Hampshire voters correct what Iowa voters do. Florida governor Ron DeSantis is trying to draw a lot of attention to that comment in Iowa. And then late last year, when she was asked about the cause of the Civil War, she failed to mention slavery.

That drew a lot of criticism from her fellow candidates and from Democrats, too. People cautioning moderate voters against her. And so we'll find out over the next couple of weeks whether or not those wobbles are something that bothers voters or if it's something they're willing to look past them.

BROOKS: Let's hear from Nikki Haley. So you mentioned that wobble about the civil war. So for months, she did manage to avoid any major controversy on the campaign trail.

I covered a bunch of events in New Hampshire. She seemed very disciplined and adapted dealing with voters. On her feet. But that did change last month at a town hall in New Hampshire, when a voter asked about the Civil War. Here's part of that exchange.

REPORTER: What was the cause of the United States Civil War?

HALEY: Don't come with an easy question or anything. I think the cause of the Civil War was basically how government was going to run. The freedoms and what people could and couldn't do. What do you think the cause of the Civil War was? I'm sorry? I think it always comes down to the role of government.

And what the rights of the people are. And we, I will always stand by the fact that I think government was intended to secure the rights and freedoms of the people.

BROOKS: So Haley took flack for that, for not even uttering the word slavery. She's also largely avoided direct criticism of Trump, for whom she worked as UN ambassador.

She positions herself as the candidate with Trump-like policies, perhaps, but without the Trumpian chaos. So here's what she said at a CNN town hall in Iowa last week.

HALEY: I personally think President Trump was the right president at the right time. I agree with a lot of his policies, but the reality is, rightly or wrongly, chaos follows him, and we all know that's true. Chaos follows him, and we can't have a country in disarray and a world on fire and go through four more years of chaos. We won't survive it.

BROOKS: So Jess Bidgood, that's her formulation. That's as close as she comes, really, as taking on Trump directly, at least as I've heard her at campaign events.

Chaos follows him. Not so much that he creates the chaos, but he seems to be a magnet for chaos. Is that about right?

BIDGOOD: Absolutely. Absolutely. You've seen her sharpen her criticism of Trump ever so slightly, where before she was saying, "I think he was the right president at the right time.

I don't think he's the right president now."

Now she's starting to explain why that is. But as we've said, the Iowa caucuses are a week away. It's a little bit late to be only now laying out your case against President Trump. And so we'll see if that moves voters at all. At the same time, she and DeSantis have both said that they would pardon Trump if he was convicted of a federal crime.

So both Haley and DeSantis are walking a very fine line when it comes to Trump, and it's one that has left the former president largely unscathed.

BROOKS: I'm wondering, Jess, because I've been thinking about this a lot. What's it been like for you to cover this particular election cycle compared to past election cycles?

Because it has been overwhelmed by this narrative that Trump has this enormous lead. So as much as you try to focus in on these other candidates, it always comes back to this. 'But Trump has a big lead. But Trump has a big lead. But Trump has a big lead.' What's that been like for you to follow as a political reporter?

BIDGOOD: So it's been really interesting. Even when I spoke with voters at Haley events who are excited about her candidacy, who like her, who want to vote for her, they often didn't think that she could win. And these are people who had showed up to see her and were sitting in the front row and planning to caucus for her.

They still didn't really believe that her candidacy could go the distance. I think that this race with a really locked in leader, that's unusual. When I covered the 2020 democratic primaries, there was a lot of movement. There were moments where one candidate overtook another, took attacks, things changed, things shifted, that hasn't so much been the case this time.

Trump is running as an incumbent. And of course, another unusual thing about this primary is these trials of the front runner looming in the background.

Part II

BROOKS: We're a week away from the Iowa caucus, six days actually. And then a week after that comes the New Hampshire primary. Joining us are Jess Bidgood, senior national political reporter at the Boston Globe.

Also joining us, Whit Ayres, the executive director of the GOP polling firm North Star Opinion. Whit, it's always a pleasure to have you. Thanks for joining us today.

WHIT AYRES: Anthony, good to be with you. It's a pleasure.

BROOKS: Also with us, Tim Miller. He's writer-at-large for The Bulwark. Tim Miller is a former Republican.

He left the party. He was a former communications director for Jeb Bush in 2016. He's also author of Why We Did It: A Travelogue from the Republican Road to Hell. Tim, always good to have you, as well. Thanks for joining us.

TIM MILLER: Hey, Anthony. Good to be with you.

BROOKS: So Tim, let me start with you. You heard the conversation with Jess at the beginning.

Is this race over? What do you think?

MILLER: I hate to be the bearer of bad news. I don't want to, I don't want this to be true, but it's just hard to see it any other way, for me, in that this race is over. Obviously, we could have a act of God or act of nature. Something can always happen in politics, but look, Donald Trump is winning overwhelmingly.

And then the one state where the polls show someone closing the gap, which is New Hampshire, where Nikki Haley is doing so, I have a lot of experience there working for more moderate mainstream candidates, and if you look historically in 2016, John Kasich finished second there with 16%. If you combine him with Jeb Bush and Chris Christie, he got, they got up to 34%.

And then they went down to South Carolina and got crushed. John Huntsman, I worked for in 2012. He was at 17% in New Hampshire, went to South Carolina and dropped out before it even happened. This just goes over and over again. This party is not really reflected by what is happening in New Hampshire, where independence and crossover Democrats and Northeastern moderate Republicans can vote. And so I just don't know. So Nikki Haley does better in New Hampshire. And then what, she's losing by 30 in her home state of South Carolina. I live in Louisiana now, last poll I saw in Louisiana had Donald Trump winning by 70 points.

So like to me, this race is over. And that's why in your previous segment, when you're asking, why do people keep saying not covering the race and saying, but Donald Trump. People keep saying, but Donald Trump, because that's what Republican voters want, is Donald Trump.

BROOKS: Whit Ayres, let me come to you, because the premise of this show is that, yes, it's Trump's race to lose. He's got a big lead, but there is a narrow path for someone else to win. I'm counting on you to give us that path but respond to what Tim Miller says. And let me know if you think there is a narrow path for someone not named Trump to win the nomination.

AYRES: It's hard to argue against what Tim said, given the obvious leads that Donald Trump has in all the key states, but I don't know how we can say that something is over with the number of unknown effects and unknown events that could happen between now and next summer. There's a sea of uncertainty here where we're facing a candidate with 91 felony counts who may very well go to trial before next summer.

So I don't know that we can say that it's inevitable that Trump wins the nomination. I do think he's a strong favorite. It would be denying the obvious to say otherwise. Nikki Haley has a path, albeit a narrow path. And it helps to understand the three parts of the Republican party to understand her path.

There is a Never Trump faction but it's only about 10%, maybe 12% that Chris Christie is going after. There's an Always Trump faction. That's somewhere around 35% to 40%. And these people are going to vote for Donald Trump regardless. Criticizing Donald Trump with Always Trump voters, it's like criticizing Jesus in a rural evangelical church, it doesn't affect Jesus's reputation, but it will sure destroy the reputation of somebody who takes a shot at him.

But a majority of the party, somewhere around 50%, are people who voted for Donald Trump twice, would vote for him again against Joe Biden in a heartbeat, but are at least open to an alternative. And that is the group of people that Nikki Haley is going after. It drives Never Trump Republicans and Democrats crazy when she refuses to say that Donald Trump is unfit for office. She doesn't adopt Chris Christie's language. It's not rocket science why she hasn't done that.

Because if you say Donald Trump is unfit and has been unfit. You insult those millions of Republican voters who supported him twice. So she dances this fine line where she is trying to say he was the right president at the right time, but now we need to move on to somebody else, which is an effort to get those Maybe Trump voters.

Does she have a shot in New Hampshire? The poll you just mentioned from the University of New Hampshire has Trump at 39%, Haley at 32%. The key to understanding different results in New Hampshire polling is not the standing of the candidates. It's the proportion of the sample that comes from the undeclared voters.

Who can vote in either primary, and without any contest in the Democratic primary, they're very likely to go into the Republican primary. That's how John McCain in 2000 who came in fourth place in Iowa. George W. Bush won at 41. McCain was at five. McCain comes along and crushes Bush 49 to 30 in New Hampshire, and he did so on the back of the undeclared voters.

In the poll you just mentioned, the undeclared voters currently favor Haley, 43, Christy, 23 and Trump, 17. If there are a lot of undeclareds that come out and vote in New Hampshire, Haley could win that race.

BROOKS: That's really interesting. Jess, I want to come to you with that. Because what Whit's talking about are a couple of things that, Iowa and New Hampshire, and your colleague James Pindell made this point in The Globe today, Iowa and New Hampshire voters almost always deliver the nation some type of surprise in their respective early primary events, James Pindell wrote.

And I don't know if you've spoken, I'm sure you have. I've spoken to Democratic leaning independents in New Hampshire who want Biden to win, but are prepared to pull a Republican ballot so that they can vote for Nikki Haley to weaken Donald Trump. I'm wondering if you've come across voters like that.

BIDGOOD: Absolutely. Absolutely. Me and my colleagues have come across voters like that, both in New Hampshire. And in Iowa, too. I think the kind of phenomenon of moderate voters or even in some cases, Democratic leading voters who want to vote for Haley because they are so worried about Trump is real.

However, if that is something that helps to propel a Haley victory in New Hampshire, you really have to ask the questions that Tim was asking at the opening of this segment, which is, what does that say about Republicans in the rest of the country? And the answer is not much.

BROOKS: It's a good point. Tim, I want to come back to you, though, because Whit also brought up Trump's legal woes, facing 91 indictments across four cases, including an election subversion case from Special Counsel Jack Smith that could have him in court in March in the heat of the primary calendar.

So yes, he's got a big lead, and his game is delay. But what kind of political peril do these cases pose for Trump? In other words, do you buy at least that part of Whit's argument, that there's a lot of unknowns here when it comes to the sort of legal peril that he faces?

MILLER: I agree with Whit that there's a lot of unknowns, and I'm hopeful and wishful that he has to face some accountability for his illegal actions, and I hope that happens before the convention. But there's not really any evidence that this legal peril is hurting him with Republican primary voters.

It's possibly helping him, even, with them. If you just look at the trends in the polls following his indictments, I do think that he faces some parallel general election swing voters. I don't think that your Atlanta suburbs type former Republican Mitt Romney voters that voted for Joe Biden in 2020 are particularly impressed with somebody that has 91 felony indictments and is borderline constitutionally ineligible to run.

So I do think that it will hurt him politically in a general election, but I just don't know what the ramifications might be for him in a primary.

Just one other thing that, again, I take Whit's point. I think it'd be interesting to see Nikki Haley surge to beat Trump in New Hampshire. But again, I like the example cited of John McCain in 2000, obviously George Bush ends up winning that.

And McCain only wins his home state and Northeastern states. And then Michigan, one other state where there's undeclared independence that can cross over and vote. And so I just think that's the fundamental problem here. If like we're counting, if Nikki's counting on these undeclared people, to win the race, then it's, okay. What is step two?

And I guess maybe step two is legal trouble or something else happens. It's certainly not that Donald Trump says something that sinks his campaign. There's nothing more that he could say at this point. So that's my fundamental objection to just the notion that a Nikki Haley, New Hampshire win would be meaningful.

BROOKS: Let me talk about some of the other candidates and why they're still in the race, because this also obviously has a big effect on the sort of dynamic, the overall dynamics of this race. So one candidate who has not attacked Trump at all is Vivek Ramaswamy, the entrepreneur. In fact, Ramaswamy often sounds like he's running for Trump, not against him.

So here he is speaking to NBC last week in Iowa.

In many sense, I support Donald Trump and his legacy. As U. S. president, I respect what his contributions are to this country. But when making the choice of who's going to lead our America First movement to the next level, that's a separate choice. I do think we're in the middle of a kind of cold cultural war in this country, between those of us who love the United States of America and a fringe minority who hates this country and what we stand for.

And when it comes to selecting a commander in chief, a general, to lead us to victory in that war, I think I'm best positioned to do it with fresh legs, as a leader who is not yet wounded in that war.

BROOKS: So that's Vivek Ramaswamy, and even without Trump, the Republican debates have gotten testy. Here's a clip of Chris Christie calling out Vivek Ramaswamy on the debate stage last month.

CHRISTIE: I’m not done yet. Now look… (CHEERS) This is the fourth debate, the fourth debate, when you would be voted in the first twenty minutes as the most obnoxious blowhard in America. So shut up for a little while. (JEERS)

RAMASWAMY: I’m going to respond to that.

BROOKS: And until very recently, most candidates have been willing to attack Trump, but that exception is Chris Christie, who's positioned himself as the anti Trump Republican. So this is part of a TV ad his campaign ran recently.

CHRIS CHRISTIE: Some people say I should drop out of this race. Really? I'm the only one saying Donald Trump is a liar. He pits Americans against each other. His Christmas message to anyone who disagrees with him? Rot in hell. He caused a riot on Capitol Hill, he'll burn America to the ground to help himself. Every Republican leader says that in private.

I'm the only one saying it in public.

BROOKS: So that's former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. Whit Ayres, why are these other candidates staying in the race? And if they were to get out, it seems to me that would make the sort of unlikely path that Nikki Haley needs a little more feasible.

AYRES: It certainly would in the case of Chris Christie.

The vast majority of Chris Christie's support would go to Nikki Haley. If indeed he got out, Chris Christie really helped Donald Trump get elected or get nominated in 2016. He savaged Marco Rubio, who was at the time a fairly credible alternative, and then turned around and endorsed Trump. Christie could help Donald Trump get nominated in 2024 as well, by hanging around and taking votes away from a more viable alternative, which is Nikki Haley. Chris Christie is not going to get the nomination, because he is a Never Trump candidate in a party where the Never Trump voters tap out at 10% or 12%.

So he is, in many ways, helping Donald Trump get the nomination. By staying in the race and taking votes away from Nikki Haley in New Hampshire and subsequent states.

BROOKS: Tim Miller, do you agree with that? Keeping in mind, and I respect your view here, that this is Trump's race to lose, but what's your take on why these other candidates are sticking around?

MILLER: Yeah. So I basically agree with Whit on that and would have had exactly the same view as him a few months ago. At this point, I just, I'm not certain that it's meaningful whether Chris Christie is in the race or not. I think it could be meaningful to the result of New Hampshire. But Chris Christie's support is so small within the party.

He's less popular than RFK Jr. among Republican voters, to get a sense for how popular Chris Christie is, significantly less. If you look at favorability ratings, his ballot number in a lot of the states after New Hampshire is like 3%, 2%. So I just don't know if it's that meaningful.

And I at least respect the argument, though, I disagree with it. Because Christie's making that maybe it's better to have somebody in the race that's actually taking Trump on more fully. So I see both sides of this argument and I'm not sure it's that meaningful as far as the actual outcome, with the exception of the New Hampshire primary.

As far as the other candidates, I think Vivek is trying to get as much vote as he can. To be able to negotiate with Donald Trump for some type of position with the Trump campaign. That's very clear. And I think DeSantis at this point just has spent so much money and so much political capital that he's running through the tape in Iowa.

I saw this with Jeb in 2016, we decided to stay in through South Carolina because he'd put so much on the line. He lost the first two primaries, but South Carolina had been good to his brother. And it was a sense of, "Let's give this one more try. Give the voters one more try."

I think maybe in retrospect, probably would have, might've made sense to drop out, but I think that's sensible, as a psychological matter, for why some of these candidates stay in.

BROOKS: I want to come back to DeSantis in a moment especially because I know Whit Ayres you actually worked for him, for his successful gubernatorial run in 2018.

So I'm interested in mining your expertise and perspective on that. But as we head toward a break, Jess, I want to put the same question to you. That both Whit and Tim answered, and give me your perspective on these other candidates that are hanging on. Particularly Chris Christie, why are they still in this race?

BIDGOOD: So we have seen, while Trump's lead has been pretty baked in, we've seen the race turn into this battle for second place, a battle primarily being waged by Haley and DeSantis. And I think one dynamic that's really interesting and really different about this race is the fact that because you have Trump's legal questions looming in the background, because you have these trials potentially taking place before the convention.

I think that could possibly scramble the calculus for other candidates about how long to stay in. Whereas before, if you don't win New Hampshire, you don't win Iowa, you don't win South Carolina. It's time to go home. I wonder if alternative candidates, particularly Haley and DeSantis, will see it as being worth sticking around longer, just given all the uncertainty looming in the background.

BROOKS: Yeah. You mean the uncertainty, for instance, if suddenly Donald Trump is facing a prison sentence, maybe some of that support he has goes away and they end up being, one of them ends up being the candidate who is standing with the best chance down the road.

BIDGOOD: Absolutely. Yeah.

Part III

BROOKS: I want to talk about Ron DeSantis. On the issues, voters are paying a lot of attention to abortion, especially since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. Since then, voters in red states, including Ohio, Kansas, have voted to uphold abortion rights in their state constitution. So this can be a difficult issue for Republican presidential candidates.

Ron DeSantis, for example, signed a six-week abortion ban as Florida's governor. So here he is last month responding carefully to a question from Kristen Welker on NBC's Meet the Press.

WELKER: Would you sign a six week federal ban if it came to your desk if you were President?

DESANTIS: But we signed legislation to stand for a culture of life that was done by the Florida legislature.

WELKER: So is that a yes?

DESANTIS: I mean this was them bringing the will of the people. Well Congress is not going to do any type of abortion legislation. They haven’t done abortion legislation. The only thing that’s impacted abortion on the federal level, I think is, last thing is Obamacare is 2010.

So we understand that. And so part of me promoting a culture of life is doing things that are achievable and obviously would have consensus. No taxpayer funding for tourism. We’re gonna eliminate the abortion tourism policy of the Department of Defense. And we’re gonna protect the rights of states to enact pro-life protection.

BROOKS: So that's Ron DeSantis, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Whit Ayres, I want to come to you for this first question. Because you worked with DeSantis on his successful campaign for governor in 2018. So you have an interesting perspective on what happened to his campaign for president. Of course, it's not over, but he began with very high hopes.

Now it seems like he's battling for survival in Iowa. He's become something of an afterthought in New Hampshire. What happened to him? People may be curious about why he appears to have stumbled so badly.

AYRES: There are multiple causes, Anthony, you're right, a year ago in a number of polls, including one of ours, he was actually ahead of Donald Trump, but he has a lot of challenges as a candidate.

We were part of his winning gubernatorial race. As you mentioned, in 2018, he will have absolutely nothing to do with any of the people associated with that race. Not the pollster, not either one of the media consultants, not the fundraising chairman, not the campaign manager. And the general consultant is now running Donald Trump's campaign.

So he has a chaotic campaign team, he's already demoted the campaign manager, at least one, he subcontracted much of the campaign to a Super PAC that he can't talk to. And so it's not exactly been a smoothly run campaign. On top of that, he's made a number of rookie mistakes that are not uncommon for a 1st time candidate, but he's made some doozies, calling Ukraine a mere territorial dispute or doubling down on whether slavery might have benefited enslaved people.

Or my favorite, suggesting that Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a vaccine skeptic, would be a good candidate to head the Centers for Disease Control. Plus, he's not exactly smooth one on one. He's got a lot of problems, and as a result, his support has been cut in half since he started campaigning. Which is not exactly what you want to see when you're running for president.

BROOKS: Yeah, Tim Miller. What have you observed? Watching Ron DeSantis.

MILLER: First, I just want to say that I'm going to be having a wet January. That we've been discussing, I respect everybody's views. I respect everybody's views. But that's just my choice. As far as DeSantis is concerned, I think the abortion issue that you hit is emblematic of something that Whit was also getting into. He gets into this race, and even putting aside his personality issues, he took a strategic approach that was basically identical to Ted Cruz's strategic approach in 2016, which was, I'm going to run to Donald Trump's cultural right.

Now I'm going to try to get to the right of him on culture war issues. All of those abortion related clips that you played at the top played into that. The DEI, the woke, going after Disney, on and on again, he said, that is the way that I'm going to get into those Always Trump voters that Whit was talking about.

And I just think that was a failed strategy from the start. And they should have known it was a failed strategy, because Ted Cruz tried it in 2016. Donald Trump might have some heterodox views, but just the nature of his personality, the nature of his political positioning, you're not going to be able to convince MAGA voters that you're more of a culture war fighter than the original culture war fighter.

So I think that was the fundamental strategic error. That then got compounded by some of the other campaign mistakes that Whit was talking about.

BROOKS: It's interesting Whit, coming back to you, Tim mentioned personality issues. As I observed Ron DeSantis at a few events in New Hampshire, I have to say, he doesn't come across as warm and fuzzy. He seems angry, seems like he wants to settle scores, and I'm not sure that plays well with lots of moderate New Hampshire Republican voters. And I'm just wondering if that syncs with what you observed, or was he a different kind of candidate when you were working for him in Florida?

AYRES: He's a very bright, very able, very driven man. But he doesn't trust very many people. And he certainly doesn't have a lot of trust or appreciation for the people around him. He trusts Casey, his wife, who's also very gifted, but that's about it. And at this level, in any level, actually, but especially at the presidential level, politics is a team sport, and you need to have people around you, who you trust and whom you've gone through some wars with.

Joe Biden has the same people around him who've been around him literally for decades, so it's a team sport, and if you don't have a team you trust, it's hard to run effectively.

BROOKS: I want to shift the conversation just a little bit and ask about the broader direction of the Republican Party.

And Jess, let me start with you to kick this idea off. Is this Trump's party from here on out? Because a lot of this discussion is premised on the idea that maybe there's a narrow road for someone like Nikki Haley. Maybe Trump's legal jeopardy gets so deep later in the year that someone else is left standing.

What's your view on that?

BIDGOOD: I think the answer is yes. It is Trump's party from here on out. We have seen various members of house leadership endorse Trump for president, even after Trump sunk their own leadership bids, right? We have seen governors and key figures around the Republican party fall in line behind Trump.

I think New Hampshire will be interesting as a test of what maybe not Trump world of voters still exists, and that's going to be something to pay some real attention to. But Trump and Trumpism have shaped the Republican party since 2016.

BROOKS: Tim Miller, I gather you agree with that.

You left the Republican Party in the post Trump reality here. What's your thought about that?

MILLER: Yeah, we could do a whole hour on this probably, but in short, just as far as present day is concerned, looking, I don't think endorsements are that important in convincing voters to change their mind, but I do think they're telling about what the state of the party is.

And of the sitting senators, congressmen, and governors, Donald Trump is closing in on 150 endorsements and Nikki Haley has 2. And so I think that tells you a lot about what the party looks like right now. And then I think going forward, look, Whit gave that breakdown of the three groups, the Never Trumpers, the Maybe Trumpers, the Always Trumpers.

That Maybe Trump group is continuing to move more and more towards a MAGA nationalist direction. And part of that is that the makeup of the party is changing. It's not just me, right? There's been some segment, some percentage of the party that since Donald Trump came in has left and either become an independent voter or a Democratic voter.

You saw this in the democratic primary in 2020. There are a lot of suburban former Republicans voting for Biden or Pete or Amy Klobuchar. And then you've had this group that has come into the Republican party that were attracted to Donald Trump. And some of that is older, working-class white voters.

Some of that is younger voters. I think about it, if you're 25 right now, when Donald Trump came down the escalator, you were in high school, that's all you really know. And so if you've chosen to come into the party now, you like the fact that the party is more MAGA, more Trumpy.

And so I think there's been a self-selecting effort that has taken a party that was already maybe 50-50 populist establishment and moved it, again, Whit's the pollster, so I'm just ballparking here, but more of a 70-30 direction. Where they like MAGA, they like Trumpism. And I think that's where we're going for the medium term, at least.

BROOKS: Whit Ayres, help us understand why Trump continues to have, this is such a basic question.

We've talked about his legal woes, 91 indictments across four cases. He makes statements like talking about immigrants poisoning the blood. He's whipped up an insurrection on January 6th. And yet tens of millions of voters continue to support him. What's your best explanation as to why?

AYRES: Donald Trump has done a very good job of tapping into resentments and grievances of people who feel like they're losing in the modern American culture, and he has inflamed those resentments and grievances and then reflected them in his campaigning. So I think that's the primary reason, is that he's speaking for an awful lot of people who are feeling left out of the current American culture, and they're worried that they're losing ground in the current American culture.

And the one that's to come.

BROOKS: Well President Biden is beginning to hit the campaign trail himself. And he's pitching himself as a protector of democracy in America. So here he is speaking at a rally in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania last week.

PRESIDENT BIDEN: This is the first national election since January 6th. Insurrection placed a dagger at the throat of American democracy since that moment.

We all know who Donald Trump is. The question we have to answer is, who are we? That's what's at stake. (APPLAUSE) Who are we? In the year ahead, as you talk to your family and friends, cast your ballots. The power is in your hands.

BROOKS: So Jess, Joe Biden, they're officially kicking off or unofficially kicking off his campaign for reelection, really putting democracy, the protection of democracy, front and center.

Is that something we're going to hear him talk about a lot in the months ahead?

BIDGOOD: Absolutely. I think that's going to be a key theme, probably the key theme for President Biden as he tries to win reelection. And it's been interesting. Because as Biden brings up January 6th, Trump bringing it up too.

And he is running a kind of openly pro January 6th campaign, where he calls people who were arrested for their activities that day hostages, right? He's really made that central as well. And I think there's one sign that the Trump campaign is worried about this democracy theme from the Biden campaign.

And that is the fact that they are now trying to accuse Biden of being a threat to democracy. They are saying that since Trump is being prosecuted for various crimes, some of which are playing out federally, that is evidence of Biden using the levers of democracy against Trump. Now, there is no evidence for that whatsoever.

I'm not sure how convincing an argument that is going to be, but it says to me that the Trump team is a little worried about this democracy theme. Because they see a need to try to pin the same thing on Biden.

BROOKS: Tim, what's your view of what Joe Biden needs to do, and what he started to do? Is putting democracy at the front and center of his campaign the right approach? I'm struck by Mitt Romney saying, that's an old issue. He needs to move on and focus on something new.

MILLER: Yeah, I disagree with Mitt about this. I think that there's a lot I like about Mitt, and but maybe his advice about presidential campaigns shouldn't be what folks listen to.

BROOKS: (LAUGHS)

MILLER: Given past performance.

But look, I understand that Biden needs to do multiple things at once, right? He has to make a case about the economy and about kitchen table issues. There are a lot of parts of the electorate for whom high minded speeches about democracy are not going to be the deciding factor. But I just think if you look at the 2022 midterms. The candidates that were the most pro insurrection, if you will, the candidates that centered their campaigns on election denialism, if you look at Kari Lake, Blake Masters, Doug Mastriano, these are in swing states, Arizona and Pennsylvania.

They got annihilated. I guess Lake's race was close, but Mastriano got annihilated and I think that if you look at a Brian Kemp, for example, in Georgia, who bucked Trump. He won his election during the midterm. So I think that there is a lot of evidence via the midterm elections that there are at least some percentage, maybe it's a small, but it might be a decisive and small percentage of swing voters, in the suburbs in particular, who do not want to support a candidate that is anti-democracy.

And I think that Biden keeping that front and center is valuable, but it can't be the only thing he talks about.

BROOKS: Whit Ayres, I want to give the last word to you. We only have about 20 seconds left here. I know you're a Republican consultant, but if you're giving Biden advice as the best way to take on Trump, would democracy be the thing that you would have him talk about?

AYRES: Right message, wrong messenger. He needs to step aside and let someone else carry that message. The vast majority of Americans think he's way too old to be president. That includes a majority of Democrats and virtually no one thinks that Kamala Harris is ready to be president. So the best advice to him is to let someone else, like some of the center left governors who've been successful in the Democratic Party carry the message rather than him.