After 4 years of a failed Harris/Biden administration, "MAGA" will resonate once again. All you need do is look at America today.
Trump will more than deserve and get a second chance to correct the course of the country and the mistake it made in November 2020.
Maybe. Maybe not. It all hinges on what happens in the 2022 midterms.
Admittedly, the margins in the Senate and the House are razor thin. Since the census happened last year, there will be a change in Congressional districts with some states gaining and some states losing representation. Then there's the issue of drawing the Congressional districts with gerrymandering being a factor.
However, it's very likely that the single greatest deciding factor will be election turnout.
Here's where a little background information is helpful. In most presidential elections, the turnout of eligible voters is a little over 50%. 52%-54% is pretty common. But in the 2020 election, almost 2/3 of eligible voters went to the polls. The bad news for Trump is that most of those voters voted either for Biden or against Trump for reasons that don't need to be revisited here.
But 2022 is an off year election, and the chances are pretty good that turnout will be far lower.
Now, even though the party in power usually loses seats in a midterm, that's not always the case. Two midterms from the 90s can show how either party can misjudge the electorate and hence their chances at winning.
In 1994, there was a lot of anger that Clinton had defeated Bush 41 and ended 12 years of Republican Presidents. Gingrich had his contract with America, and I could feel a red wave coming. I was right, and Republicans took the House for the first time in over 40 years.
But four years later in 1998 it was a totally different story when a popular reelected Clinton with an approval rating of around 60% was facing an Impeachment pushed by Tom DeLay that the public did not support, and Republicans ended up losing seats which ultimately led to Newt Gingrich resigning his seat right after the first of the year.
So, what's going to happen in 2022?
The vast majority of conservatives have decided to hitch their wagons to Trump and the big lie about a stolen election. But the party is not unified. The GOP is going to have to contend with high profile members like Liz Cheney railing against Trump. While the conservative base may be enamored with Trump and his unorthodox behavior, there are one hell of a lot of people who find him repugnant, and as most people know, negative emotions can be far more motivating than positive ones.
Having said that, I've recently listened to some conservatives describe the Jan 6 riot as a peaceful protest. I actually heard one Republican say it was like a tourist visit. All I can say about that is this: If you think average Americans, especially Independents who don't walk in lockstep to either political party, are going to listen to that kind of nonsense for the next 18 months and reward conservative Republicans for it, I think you're dreaming.
So, if Republicans fail to take over the majority in the House and/or the Senate and actually end up losing seats instead, the dream of Trump running again in 2024 will be little more than a pipe dream because Trump will have taken the GOP down a losing path in the last three elections (2018, 2020, 2022) while also never winning the popular vote in 2016. They certainly won't want to make it four election losses in a row in 2024.