Over the past few years since Donald Trump burst onto the political
scene as a Republican candidate, there have been predictions that he would
destroy the Republican Party. While those predictions have not yet been borne
out, a new poll shows that President Trump has fundamentally transformed the
GOP.
The Harvard-Harris
poll released last weekend was mostly noticed for its revelation that Joe
Biden had increased his lead over rival Democrat Bernie Sanders, but the
poll also contained an enlightening question for Republican voters. The survey
asked self-identified Republicans, “Do you consider yourself to be more a
supporter of Donald Trump or more of a supporter of the Republican Party?” The
answer was that a plurality considered themselves Trumpists by almost a 20-point
margin.
Forty-five percent of respondents said that they supported
Donald Trump personally rather than the Republican Party while 27 percent
supported the GOP, presumably referring to the party’s traditional, pre-Trump
principles. Eighteen percent supported both equally and eight percent supported
neither.
These results confirm previous polls that indicate that
Republican voters have jettisoned traditional Republicanism for loyalty to
Donald Trump. The polling also offers an explanation for why Republican politicians
find it difficult to criticize the president and keep their promise to hold him
accountable. While many Republicans have simply remained quiet about Trump’s
excesses, others, such as South Carolina’s Lindsey Graham, have apparently read
the writing on the wall and completed a full 180 to become stalwart Trump
defenders.
When asked which selected terms they most identified with,
the top answer was “conservative Republican,” but this answer was chosen by
only 19 percent of respondents as their first of three choices. The phrase “Trump
Republican” finished second with 18 percent, which represents a statistical
tie. “Christian conservative” was third at 15 percent followed by “moderate
Republican” at 12 percent. Eight percent declared themselves to be “Reagan
Republicans. Tellingly in an administration that is running a trillion dollar
deficit, only eight percent identified with the phrase “fiscal conservative.”
In total, “conservative Republican” was only chosen as one
of three choices by 46 percent of Republican respondents. Overall, 40 percent
identified as “Trump Republican.” Thirty-two percent liked the “Reagan Republican”
label while 30 percent identified as “moderate Republican” and 27 percent
selected “Christian conservative.” Only 26 percent of the total identified as “fiscal
conservative” and 13 percent as “social conservative.”
The self-labeling indicates that Donald Trump has changed
the perception of what “conservative” means. It is no longer synonymous with
the word “Republican” and, to many, the phrase “Trump conservative” is an
oxymoron.
While some may view the shift as one that is largely semantic,
the realignment of the Republican Party behind Trump represents a major shift
in the party’s principles. The party has become overtly
anti-immigration and protectionist where in the past it supported legal
immigration and free trade. Republicans have jettisoned fiscal conservatism for
an exploding deficit and the principle of small government has given way to proposals
for regulating social media, creating a national childcare entitlement,
expanding policing of the border and the immigrant workforce, and intrusions onto
which employees should be hired or fired by private companies. Where guns could
formerly be pried from cold dead hands, Republicans now glance away as the
Trump Administration requires gun owners to surrender bump stocks without
compensation. While it still opposes increased income taxes, Republicans cheer
on Trump’s massive taxes on international trade that take as much or more from
American pockets as tax reform put in. The party now rejects the rule of law
when it is inconsistent with President Trump’s wishes.
It is likely that the future of the Republican Party will
not be determined in 2020 but in the post-Trump primaries. President Trump remains
overwhelmingly popular among those who remain Republican and no high-profile
candidate has emerged to challenge the incumbent president. It will only be after
Trump leaves office and Republicans are given a clean slate that we can see
whether Trump’s populist approach will take root or if the party will revert to
its old conservative character. Given the depth of the party’s adulation of Donald
Trump, I’m not optimistic for a return to small government conservatism.
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