Jonathan V Last/The Bulwark:
The Shape of Things to Come
The future is Trump. And Trump will continue to misunderestimate Joe Biden.
Joe Biden’s strengths are mostly hidden.
He does not have a cult of personality. He does not dominate the media. He does not engender strong feelings either for or against. His party is not afraid of him.
In a race that will be run as a contract election, designed to create a referendum on Donald Trump, these are all advantages.1
The economy is in very good shape, and the longer this winning streak continues, the more fully its effects are felt by voters.
Biden has a long list of legislative accomplishments which are broadly popular. Taken together, they create a rationale for his re-election: Vote for Biden and he will continue to work with Republicans to pass laws that create jobs, invest in infrastructure, reform the least-popular parts of gun laws, etc.
This is another contrast with Trump, who has no actual policy rationale for his candidacy beyond personal retribution, “stopping” immigration (good luck), and drilling for oil (which Biden has done more of than any president in history, including Trump).
Trump will continue to face criminal proceedings, and unlike in the primaries, where this fact was helpful to Trump, in the general election everything about these trials will hurt him.
Bill Scher/Washington Monthly:
Forget New Hampshire. After Trump’s Iowa Landslide, It’s Over.
The Hawkeye state rarely predicts a GOP nominee, but with Trump, it’s different.
Often diluting the conservative base in New Hampshire are those independent voters. In the last three competitive New Hampshire primaries, the share of independents ranged from 37 to 47 percent. For other states on the primary calendar through Super Tuesday, where the 2016 exit poll is available, outside New England, that share is always below one-third.
So why did New Hampshire catapult Trump in 2016? Remember, Trump only won 35 percent of the vote. The totals of Trump’s then-center-right opponents John Kasich, Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, Chris Christie, and Carly Fiorina—and you get 49 percent.
Trump prevailed in New Hampshire because the party establishment failed to consolidate behind one candidate. The conservative grassroots wasn’t quite unified either. After winning Iowa, the hard-right Cruz came in third in New Hampshire with 12 percent. But it was becoming increasingly disdainful towards an establishment they viewed as timid and quickly coalesced around Trump once the campaign moved past New Hampshire to more conservative states.
If the New Hampshire electorate hasn’t changed much since 2016, then Nikki Haley has a decent chance of claiming that center-right 49 percent and winning a three-way or four-way race. Of course, that’s hardly a certainty. Trump and Cruz combined for 47 percent eight years ago, and current polling shows Trump in the lead in New Hampshire, holding on to most of that right-wing faction. The state’s Republican divide means it’s anyone’s guess about who wins.
Sarah Longwell/The Bulwark:
It’s Time for Former Trump Officials to Come Out Against Him
We need Trump Officials Against Trump.
If we want to stop a Trump restoration and the promised MAGA dictatorship, it’s going to require building a coalition of people who understand the stakes. And there are no messengers better equipped to convey the peril of a Trump presidency than those who lived it firsthand, on the inside.
But wait, haven’t they done that already? Mark Milley posed for a front-page spread in the Atlantic. John Kelly gave a statement to CNN. Others have back-channeled their grave misgivings, off the record, to Puck and Politico.
Hard truth: That’s not enough. I talk to Republican primary voters every week in focus groups, and you know what they don’t read? The Atlantic, Puck, and Politico. Fundamentally, the reason they seem unbothered by Trump’s autocratic tendencies is that a lot of them don’t know about them.
Example number 70-gajillion of “it’s too early to poll the race.” But if you want a detailed report, there’s this:
Charlie Sykes/The Bulwark:
Dominant but Vulnerable
Iowa's mixed message.
And then there are the trials, and Trump’s decision to campaign from courtrooms across the country.
Jonathan Martin/POLITICO:
The GOP Is Already Clashing Over Trump’s VP Pick
While Trump tries to sew up the nomination, his camp is already feuding about his future running mate — and hoping it isn’t Nikki Haley.
As Nikki Haley emerges as the former president’s most formidable opponent in the coming states, and toughens her rhetoric, her Trumpworld foes are intensifying their own efforts to block her from the consolation prize of the vice presidency.
Haley’s critics have even privately warned Trump that, were he to make Haley first in line to the presidency, he’d effectively be setting himself up for an intra-party coup, as GOP senators would use any legal or political pretext to remove him from office and elevate the more old guard-aligned Haley.
“Nikki Haley as VP would be an establishment neocon fantasy and a MAGA nightmare,” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) told me. “On Day One she would convert the Naval Observatory into an anti-Trump, resistance headquarters, undermining him at every step.”
The Stop Nikki effort is so forceful because Trump’s decision will go to the heart of the party’s debate over its identity.
There’s the obvious — the term-limited Trump selecting an Oval Office heir — but it’s not only succession issues that’s sparking the Haley pushback.
ABC News:
DOJ cites 'unimaginable horror' and 'cascading failures' in scathing Uvalde shooting report
Nineteen students and two teachers died in the shooting at Robb Elementary.
"The extent of misinformation, misguided and misleading narratives, leaks, and lack of communication about what happened on May 24 is unprecedented and has had an extensive, negative impact on the mental health and recovery of the family members and other victims, as well as the entire community of Uvalde," the Justice Department report said.
Stephanie Miller and Cliff Schecter on Ron DeSantis: