WHAT IF PRESIDENT TRUMP HAD A SERIOUS PRIMARY CHALLENGE?

…Could Ohio Governor, John Kasich, be the appropriate challenger to take on Donald Trump?

President Trump is showing that the outside pressures are really getting to him.

In watching how since the mid-term elections, our sitting president has seemed to let all those outside pressures really get to him.  This last week has reminded us that Trump cannot handle the pressure of special counsel Robert Mueller breathing down his neck.  That coupled with the prospect of Democratic congressional scrutiny after next January 3^rd and what will he do if Robert Mueller indicts his son, Donald Trump Jr. or proves that Trump aide Roger Stone was actually plotting with WikiLeaks chief Julian Assange?

Think about what Trump will do in the event of a damning Mueller report. It’s not out of the question that he will “lose it”, and I mean really lose it and do something that convinces even his Republican voter base that he cannot hold up for another campaign, let alone a second term.

He might even try pardoning everyone in sight or leave the office, demanding that Vice President Pence pardon them all.  So, as Trump likes to say: “We’ll see what happens”.

With that in mind, and the way he is currently acting, I think that some well-placed person, with sufficient political stature, if they were a type that could stand up to Trump and were able to ridicule and provoke him, they might give him a good run for the 2020 Republican nomination.

Yes, it could also be a useless gesture.

But let’s look at what happened back in the 1968 campaign.

Primaries against a sitting president are funny things. In 1968, Eugene McCarthy didn’t beat President Lyndon Johnson in New Hampshire in 1968; he lost to Johnson by 6 points.

But it was a moral victory for McCarthy that sent a serious shudder through the Democratic Party and through the Johnson White House.  It prompted Robert Kennedy to enter the race and that lead to Johnson’s withdrawal from the race a few weeks later. You never know what will happen in a dynamic race or what the prospect of losing may have on an unpopular, besieged incumbent president like Donald J. Trump.

So, what’s the worst that could happen to the individual that would take on the current president.  Actually, there is little downside to someone making the effort. The worst that can happen is that Trump would still win.

But, there is another option.

The primary challenger, if you will, could act like the race horse that jumps out to the lead, wears down the favorite and allows his Democratic stablemate to come from behind for the victory. And yes, sometimes, the lead horse could also actually win.

But if the current president actually had a real primary challenge, and they could really take on Trump, perhaps someone like a traditional conservative Republican such as Senator Jeff Flake or Senator Bob Corker, those voters that are ready to not vote again for Trump in 2020, they might see the primary challenger as an appropriate option other than voting for a Democrat. 

And a primary run doesn’t preclude a third-party run by a totally different candidate, most likely a highly moderate candidate in the event Trump would win the GOP nomination.

As of today, Ohio Gov. John Kasich, is totally anti-Trump and he has been visiting Nebraska and New Hampshire, which he explained is the ideal circumstances for such a run.  “Kasich was speculating on what it would take to break the two-party system wide open.  Per kasich, he imagined a 2020 matchup between Trump and a left-wing Democrat would create ‘a vast open ocean between the two parties.’ ” The decision to mount a third-party run could actually wait until after both parties pick their nominee, but if Trump falters in the primary, nothing would stop Kasich (or anyone else) from entering the race.

For now, Kasich occupies an enviable position.  A non-candidate like Kasich with his high name ID can continue to criticize Trump and urge his fellow Republicans to hold Trump accountable for his false rhetoric and his actions.

I know, this is all just conjecture, but then again, what if?

Copyright G.Ater  2018