It’s Not Good Bye, It’s See You Later, But First…
Hello Hackaroos!
Well, we know it’s been a while, but we’ve been carefully monitoring all of the latest twists and turns from the midterms to the latest woes for Trump World, including the big win for the Democrats in Georgia on Tuesday. What does it all mean for the road ahead for both parties, especially as we gear up for 2024? That's where we start and that's where we end (including our take on the latest DNC calendar moves).
Speaking of where we end, most importantly, if you read to the bottom (we know you all do already!), we’ve also got some big news for all of you about our future home as a newsletter.
With that, let’s begin…
THE DEATH CURSE OF TRUMP
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) celebrating at the Capitol yesterday (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
MURPHY: Well Gibbsie, the formidable DEATH CURSE OF THE TRUMP has killed its final Senate seat in 2022. An impressive achievement by the Orange Menace, I must say. A comically awful Trump Chosen candidate lost a vital Senate seat in a state that was more than ready to cast a traditional protest vote against a President (who has an approval rating in that state of barely 40%). That ain’t easy, but the Trump Senate wrecking crew (apologies to Glen Campbell, Carol Kaye, Hal Blaine and the rest), aided by a meek and cowed national Republican Leadership, gave the Democrats the mighty gift of 2022: a disastrous midterm failure that should never have happened. But the GOP earned this mess; a punishment they richly deserved. Now, however, the cult of Trump is soon to be broken into smaller pieces and a great and necessary Republican civil war will begin. Donald Trump is now in the weakest political position he has ever been in, so stay tuned… sharp knives are out.
Fun Sideshow Dept: the death match between the NRSC (National Republican Senatorial Committee) and Team Mitch McConnell will explode into open warfare now; with Team Mitch trying to tag Rick Scott and the NRSC with full blame for the Georgia debacle. I recommend large bowls of popcorn. (FWIW, I’m 100% with Team McConnell. The NRSC has been a clown car this cycle, though again ultimate blame should go to Trump, not just the hapless yet super ambitious Trump fanboy Sen. Rick Scott.)
GIBBS: Murphy, I think you feel like an increasing number of Republicans now more than a month after the November election. Tuesday was the cherry on top as Sen. Raphael Warnock won in a runoff in Georgia, a state we both identified as crucial in 2022 long ago. There’s a lot to say about this race. Herschel Walker brought name ID and very little else to this race, but his celebrity caught the eye of the former President and there was no stopping his nomination. The result was a race lost when EVERY OTHER statewide GOPer won. EVERY OTHER GOPer. Warnock actually improved his margins in a huge number of counties as Walker never overcame sky high negatives with independent voters from a controversial past and frankly the lack of any real rationale for running, evident in a campaign of hollow talking points disguised as a message. Credit though to Warnock and his team which, despite some Dems mindlessly wondering why the margin wasn’t bigger, enjoyed the largest statewide win by a Democrat in THREE DECADES. THREE DECADES. The candidate and the campaign knew their message and executed it to perfection. Georgia certified itself as a swing state with staying power that is enormously important to the future of the Democratic Party. Go back and look at Georgia in 2004 when George Bush won re-election and look at the county vote totals in metro Atlanta and you will see what change really looks like. The result is a growing state that Dems have a real shot at winning electorally despite some disappointing statewide losses, namely the Governor’s race.
Even before last night, no one has had a worse month than Donald Trump. Court cases abound, his company was convicted of tax fraud, he’s dined with Nazi-loving white nationalists and crazy rappers, called for the termination of the Constitution and lost almost every race he’s touched. Crazy, election denying disciples were rejected from coast to coast this cycle as voters craved normalcy, which proved the victor. Professional Republicans seem fed up. The question is whether base Republicans have had enough. We know an increasing number of bar patrons at the Capitol Hill Club are tired of losing even if many still can’t quite bring themselves to say Trump has gone too far this time. The GOP primaries are still more than a year away and someone has to actually beat Trump in the voting booth to take away his championship wrestling belt. It all sets up what should be a truly amazing 2023 and 2024 (yes, we are officially there!).
DNC MAKES A VERY BIG MOVE
MURPHY: Every sharp eye in national politics has been closely watching the DNC this week; the Dems announced their big plan to revise the 2024 Presidential Primary calendar. The DNC ran a well thought out process to try to “reform” the process, noting that 2020 was, shall we say, bumpy. The cited goals of the Donkey’s endeavor were lofty; make the early primary electorate more diverse (better reflecting the party base), help align more swing states to early primaries to beef up Democratic chances in the general election, and run a fair and open process to sort this all out. (Kudos to our Friend Mo Elleithee, one of the crafty architects of the whole thing; check out Axe and I discussing it all with him this week on Hacks.)
Of course, like gambling in Capt Renault’s casino, raw politics was clear and present. The actual goal of the whole thing was to: crush Iowa for badly screwing up last time, add more voters of color to the early states, and do whatever the White House wanted. So the DNC primary calendar plan hewed closely to a timely “suggestions” letter from the White House LINK. It shuffles the process as follows:
South Carolina/Jim Clyburn is now the first contest: a Primary on Feb 3 (Saturday).
New Hampshire and Nevada (primary this time, no longer a caucus) follow on Tuesday Feb 6.
Then Georgia a week later on February 13. Then Michigan on February 27.
So… a new Big Five. SC (south and majority Black), NH (New England, white), Nevada (West, and heavily Latino), Michigan (everything and Midwest; key in general election) and Georgia (New South, and every Democrat’s favorite new swing state – at least when the R’s run insane candidates). The perfect mix… on paper.
It is a great political schedule if Joe Biden is running for re-election. (Note: are we totally sure he is?). In an open seat race, if Biden does not run, however, it also has potential winners. It certainly opens up a ray of hope for Kamala Harris, whose flagging political position badly needed a rescue mission (a mighty chore that is far from finished). No bad for MI Gov. Gretchen Whitmer either, with Michigan now early enough to help her, but not early enough to be an expectations nightmare.
One problem however: NH. Being the First in the Nation primary is not a hobby up there, it is an industry. The Granite State takes a Granite-like attitude on these matters and there is even a state law requiring New Hampshire to automatically move up if another state tries to hold a primary before it. (Iowa getting a pass as a caucus in the past.) Now the DNC is saying if NH breaks the new rules and moves up, it’ll lose delegates and any candidate who goes on the ballot there will be punished as well, probably locked out of official primary TV debates. NH responds, “Who cares? We barely have any delegates anyway.”
My take? If Biden runs without serious opposition, NH may move up, have no delegates and nobody will care outside of the Granite State. But if Biden doesn’t run – still possible in my mind – then it’ll be a fascinating situation. I think candidates will indeed go to an early NH – looking for breakthrough media attention not a handful of delegates – and the media will cover it big. And good luck trying to ban any surging candidate who was on the NH ballot from later DNC sponsored debates DNC. So we’ll see where this all lands. (There is also the GOP angle; GA Republicans may not allow the contest to move up, while Michigan Republicans are hinting they are OK with it. We’ll see as this battle now moves to state leaders.)
One very clever footnote in the whole caper: the Dems put an escape hatch for the future in their plan; it says that the Democratic primary calendar can be changed for the 2028 election; nothing is locked in stone. So in 2028, there will be a new and vitally important early primary; the battle to control the DNC and hold the pen that writes the new calendar to your candidate’s advantage. Whew…
GIBBS: Whew is right! The DNC needed to make the nominating process more diverse earlier in the voting and did so. After 2008, I still have a soft spot (and always will) for the process of Iowa that tests a candidate and campaign’s ability to develop a potent message, organize around it and deliver delegates. Here’s hoping the other states take the nominating exercise as seriously as Iowans do. I’ve long heard the phrase of how Iowans won’t commit to a candidate until they’ve met them half a dozen times. While that may be an overstatement, it certainly has real truth to it. But, Murphy, you are right that while the cover was a more diverse slate of important battleground states, the impact for Biden is clear: there will be no insurgent campaign against him with a chance of success. Starting with the state that catapulted him to the nomination after he lost his frontrunner status through a string of embarrassing losses, South Carolina starts the nominating race and will quickly crown Biden the winner without so much as a skirmish. All signs now point to Biden running, with this new map the surest sign. Will be interesting to see what happens beyond this cycle and I agree the Granite State is unlikely to go quietly into the night. They’ll have a mid-December 2023 primary if that’s what it takes and given the likely spirited GOP race, one thing is certain: where there are political reporters, there will be candidates, so expect to see Biden there ensuring he doesn’t create a general election/electoral vote issue for himself in 2024.
WE’LL BE BACK.
So Bulletin, the platform for your beloved Hacks on Tap newsletter is going away. We thank them for helping us launch – we are told we are one of the most popular newsletters on the platform. But we have lost our home, so this will be our last newsletter here, in our current format. Fear not, however!
In January, we’re moving the newsletter to Substack as our new distribution platform at hacksontap.substack.com. Archive issues will be available there too. You won't have to re-subscribe as our subscriber list is moving there as well! Our 2023 missives will automatically be delivered to current subscribers' inboxes. If it's well into January and you still aren't receiving the newsletter, check to see whether hacksontap@substack.com is forwarding to your spam folder (and here’s some tips to get out of spam jail).
So until next year, when we hope to pop up again in your inbox, have a wonderful Holiday Season!
Best,
Mike and Robert