At present, Trump is crushing all of his Republican opponents. Granted, we'll need to see the next few rounds of polling to see if this indictment has had an impact on Trump's numbers. I believe all of his opponents are in the single digits when it comes to support from Republican voters, except DeSantis, whose numbers barely make it into double digits and who Trump leads by at least 20 points in most polls.
That means, Pat, that the "base" voters, are still firmly in the Trump camp. Or call them the MAGA voters, but they have an extremely unfavorable opinion of DeSantis.
Sure, it's early, and we don't have announcements that these other people are running yet, but is a horrid field that is far weaker than the field of Republicans that faced Trump in the 2016 primary. People like Pence, Haley, and Pompeo are going to struggle to get 4-6% of the Republican vote. DeSantis against Trump, looks like he may top out in primary voting at around 12-14% unless something changes.
It looks like those MAGA voters are going to stick with Trump. Nothing sways them. So, he is going to kick off the primary with a big lead on everybody, and so far DeSantis looks like no match for him.
I'll give you that part of why Trump leads his Republican opponents is because he is the most well-known name nationwide in the field. The thing is while getting indicted surely will hurt him even more in the general, it is likely to make his supporters turn out in droves in the Republican primary. Trump started selling indictment t-shirts literally the minute the indictment was announced. So, they know it is helping him against his fellow Republicans.
Add to this, his Republican opponents are tying both arms behind their backs, including DeSantis, by not using Trump's legal problems and criminality against him. It will be hard enough for them to beat Trump if they went right at him, but by praising him and calling his indictment some kind of thing the Democrats are doing (it's not), is just playing right into Trump's hands. These people are lining up like lambs to the slaughter, Pat. Trump will destroy them because they won't fight back against him.
Washington Republicans are falling in to protect Trump. They are making it easy for Trump to destroy his Republican opponents. I'm amazed at how stupidly they are playing this. They expected DeSantis to go at Trump and he has shown he won't. He picked up popularity by being Don's mini me and is too afraid to go after him. Trump suffers from none of this fear. He will shred lightweights like Pence, Pompeo, Haley, and yes, Ron.
Great that you are off the Trump horse, Pat, but the party is not. The elected Republicans still fear him and have no backbone and no balls. So, they are steering the ship right at the iceberg. Basically, they are way too late to get off. They missed their chances multiple times. Now, they can only hope he either drops dead, or they manage to destroy the justice system and declare him king.
