The US President may have lost the Presidential elections held in November last year. Today, he may also have become an easy target over the US Capitol breach. But notwithstanding whatever transpired in the recent past, the fact remains that it is Trump who resurrected the Republican Party from the dead.
If we rewind to 2016, one would notice how the Republic Party – the Grand Old Party (GOP) was being written off by everyone. It was widely predicted that Hilary Clinton would storm to power. After all, she was being backed by Barack Hussein Obama, who had himself remained the President for two consecutive terms and was then at the peak of his popularity. The GOP had its back against the wall and so it gambled by fielding Trump.
The Trump gamble did pay off spectacularly for the Republican Party. By 2016, the GOP was being seen as an extreme conservative, white supremacist party. Democrats and the Western-liberal media also dismiss Trump and his supporters as racist. But Trump supporters understand what the US President has done for their country.
The Republican Party was, of course, a strong party even in the pre-Trump era. But the GOP was getting more and more restricted to the countryside, and was also failing to connect with the American youth. This is when Trump came up with fresh ideas. For starters, his ‘Make America Great Again’ campaign reinvigorated nationalism in the US political space. Trump’s pro-American outlook became an instant hit with the American middle class.
Perhaps even more endearing to the US electorate were the Trump-led Republican Party’s promises to bring US troops home and end all of America’s wars across the globe. Trump did become a Deep State target for cutting the war lobby in the Washington D.C. to size, but his anti-intervention approach resonated within the United States of America.
It is not as if Trump has done any damage to the Republican Party ethos. He remains a proud Conservative and promises to stand by his ideological promise of upholding law and order. However, what Trump has managed to do is shed the White-supremacist image despite the relentless propaganda against him by the Democrats. Even during the November polls, Trump made new inroads with Black and Latino voters.
Come 2021, Trump has redefined the Republican Party. The GOP came close to winning the November Presidential elections, a feat that no other Republican could have achieved given the level of pro-Democrat propaganda in the US and beyond. So, in 2016, Trump was a compulsion or a gamble for the Republicans, now the Republicans cannot imagine a Trump-less GOP.
Trump’s impression upon the Republican Party is going to stay. And his persona has actually given rise to a new, modern Republican Party. Earlier, Republicans themselves used to have many people from the ‘Deep State’. George Bush’s Iraq intervention, for example, was not very different from the regime change wars that were initiated by the Democrats later.
But he has shown the will to fight the ‘Deep State’. His Presidency has created a set of dynamic, a new set of Republican Party leaders- Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio and Josh Hawley being some of the examples. Anti-Trump Republicans like Mitt Romney and Mitch McConnell, on the other hand, are becoming completely obsolete. Now, it is understood that it is people like Cruz, Rubio or Trump administration officials like Mike Pompeo, who will take the Republic Party forward.
The Trump era has nevertheless ensured that the Republican Party doesn’t fade into irrelevance and stands up to the Democrats.