Will Trump win in 2020?
Tim Lynch writes at Stuff:
The good news if you don’t like US President Donald Trump: he has less than 24 months remaining in his first term in office. The bad news: he now looks to have a better chance at staying in office until 2025.
This year’s midterm elections broke for Trump much more than expected.
The Republicans maintained their control of the Senate, picking up key victories in Indiana, Missouri and North Dakota. And though the Democrats regained control of the House of Representatives, as expected, this is not the counter-revolution they were hoping for.
It is not a Trump wave, but it has confirmed the president’s staying power. Love him or hate him, he remains a remarkable political phenomenon.
It was a good result for the Democrats but not a wave or a wall. And 2020 will not just be an up or down on Trump, but a choice between Trump and the Democratic candidate. And they may not choose wisely.
Trump for president in 2020: Trump looks to be in a better position for re-election than many commentators had believed.
The Democrats did take back the House, but that is par for the course in midterm elections. What’s more telling is that they did not invade Trump territory – the deep-red parts of the South, Midwest and Rust Belt – in any substantial way. Winning control of the House could make life difficult for Trump, but the Democrats cannot remove him from office without a sizeable majority in the Senate – which seems a world away.
Also, the midterms should make it a near-certainty that no serious Republican will challenge Trump for the presidential nomination in 2020. He has proven once again that he is an impressive electoral campaigner with a crude but effective grasp of strategy.
Yeah no doubt he will be renominated with little challenge.
There is not a Democratic messiah in waiting: Texas Senate candidate Beto O’Rourke looked like he might be this figure – a person to energise the party much the way then-Senator Barack Obama did in 2008 – but O’Rourke lost his race against incumbent Ted Cruz, despite a very tight contest.
Democrats still need a platform that is about more than “Stop Trump.”
The prediction market has the following favourites as nominees:
- Senator Kamala Harris, California 22%
- Former VP Joe Biden, Delaware 16%
- Senator Bernie Sanders, Vermont 15%
- Senator Elizabeth Warren, Massachusetts 10%
- Senator Amy Klobuchar, Minnesota 10%
- Senator Cory Booker, New Jersey 9%
- Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, New York 6%
- Oprah Winfrey, Illinois 6%
The generic odds of a Democrat winning in 2022 is 54%. That’s better than even but not by much.