Is the Republican Party in decline?

[Alben Barkley]

Only won the popular vote once since 1988.

Lost their House majority.

Has effectively become a personality cult built around one individual who will very likely be dead or in jail within the next few years.

Has shown no ability to get their base out to vote when said individual is not on the ballot.

Has plummeted with white, college-educated and suburban voters (the highest propensity voters).

Electoral college and Senate advantages may be slipping as states like AZ, GA, NC, TX move left.

Base is dying off, party has almost zero appeal to future generations and growing demographics.

Literally doesn't even have a platform anymore.

If we're going to ask this question about the Democratic Party, which just won the presidency against an incumbent who couldn't even get 47% of the vote, why not ask it about a party that you could make a much better case is slowly but surely declining?

[ProgressiveModerate]

They do have some serious issues, trying to narrowly eek out wins through winning a minority of votes isn't a sustainable strategy long term since a lot of these advantages swing back and forth. Like I said in the other thread for if the Democratic Party is in decline, both parties will start adjusting their messaging if they find they start losing to much. Both parties have some issues going forwards that can't be overlooked, but I doubt we'll get to a point anytime soon where one party has a long-term majority.

[WIResident]

Only won the popular vote once since 1988.

Lost their House majority.

Has effectively become a personality cult built around one individual who will very likely be dead or in jail within the next few years.

Has shown no ability to get their base out to vote when said individual is not on the ballot.

Has plummeted with white, college-educated and suburban voters (the highest propensity voters).

Electoral college and Senate advantages may be slipping as states like AZ, GA, NC, TX move left.

Base is dying off, party has almost zero appeal to future generations and growing demographics.

Literally doesn't even have a platform anymore.

If we're going to ask this question about the Democratic Party, which just won the presidency against an incumbent who couldn't even get 47% of the vote, why not ask it about a party that you could make a much better case is slowly but surely declining?

Neither party is going anywhere and presidential elections will be hard-fought tossups well into the future. The Democrats are at a serious disadvantage in the Electoral College though which makes it easier for Republicans to win while losing the popular vote and this scenario will likely happen again in the next 20 years. Republicans also need to do better among younger voters in future elections although most people do tend to get more conservative as they age.

[Alben Barkley]

Only won the popular vote once since 1988.

Lost their House majority.

Has effectively become a personality cult built around one individual who will very likely be dead or in jail within the next few years.

Has shown no ability to get their base out to vote when said individual is not on the ballot.

Has plummeted with white, college-educated and suburban voters (the highest propensity voters).

Electoral college and Senate advantages may be slipping as states like AZ, GA, NC, TX move left.

Base is dying off, party has almost zero appeal to future generations and growing demographics.

Literally doesn't even have a platform anymore.

If we're going to ask this question about the Democratic Party, which just won the presidency against an incumbent who couldn't even get 47% of the vote, why not ask it about a party that you could make a much better case is slowly but surely declining?

Neither party is going anywhere and presidential elections will be hard-fought tossups well into the future. The Democrats are at a serious disadvantage in the Electoral College though which makes it easier for Republicans to win while losing the popular vote and this scenario will likely happen again in the next 20 years. Republicans also need to do better among younger voters in future elections although most people do tend to get more conservative as they age.

Last part is not actually true, if anything closer to the opposite:

https://www.livescience.com/2360-busting-myth-people-turn-liberal-age.html

But really it has more to do with when you are born and grow up:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/07/08/upshot/how-the-year-you-were-born-influences-your-politics.html

There is no reason to believe based on this that millennials will suddenly become conservative.

[Annatar]

Well the statistics would say no, in terms of state legislatures, Republicans are the strongest they have been since the 1920's.

They hold the Senate and have a huge advantage now because of the 2016 realignment, only 26 states with 52 senate seats voted to the right of the nation in 2012, that went up to 64 senate seats in 2016 and 62 in 2020, even if Republicans run average candidates, in most years they will win control of the senate due to the post 2016 realignment which gives them a huge advantage in the Senate.

In the house, they will almost assuredly take back control in 2022 and they will be able to expand their number of safe seats since they control redistricting in most states.

With regard to demographics, well a lot could be written here, and there a lot of myths.

Let us start with age, the oldest Republican coalition was in 2012, in 2016 Trump did worse with voters over 65, winning them by 7% vs 12% for Romney, he did better with younger voters, so the Republican coalition got younger in 2016 relative to 2012, in 2020 again Trump lost as much or more ground with overs over 65 than voters under 65 so the coalition became somewhat younger again.

Regarding the base dying off, according to the AP exit polls, Trump won 65+ voters 51/48 over Biden, basically a 50/50 split, and we know of the 65+ voters, the most Republican are those born in the 1940's, so voters in their late 60's, so Biden likely won voters in their late 70's and 80's, the voters who dies the most each year, so actually more Biden voters are likely to die by 2024 than Trump voters, so the GOP base is hardly dying off when more Biden voters are likely to die each year than Trump voters.


As for appeal to future generations, well as long as people keep getting more Republican as they get older the GOP will be fine, I am using Edison exit polls here since they go back decades and use the same methodology, Clinton's best age group in 1996 were voters aged 18-29, he won them by 19%, how did these voters vote 20 years later when they were in their 40's, 40-49 year olds voters voted for Trump by a 3% margin, that is a 22% shift towards Republicans over 20 years.

Let us take a more recent example, in 2016, 30-39 year old voters voted for Clinton by 12%, who were the cohorts that turned 30 by 2020 vs 2016, well it was 25-29 year olds in 2016 who in 2020 were now in their 30's, well 25-29 year olds voted by 16% for Clinton. So in theory the 30-39 year old cohort should have gotten more democratic in 2020 as a D+16 cohort replaced voters in their early 30's, did that happen, no, Biden won 30-39 year old voters by 5%, so he did worse despite a more democratic cohort, voters in their late 20's replacing voters in their early 30's, so again voters became more Republican as they aged.


Let us go on, in 2008 voters aged 18-29 voted for Obama by 34%, these voters in 2020 were aged 30-42, so mainly 30-39, did they vote by 34% for the democrats, no, Biden won 30-39 voters by 5%.

I could go on and give example after example of voters getting more Republican as they get older but it would get repetitive.

As for high propensity voters, Republicans still do better with voters over 30 than under 30, these are the voters that really stay home in non-presidential years and Republicans do worse than democrats with Hispanic voters who also don't tend to vote much outside of presidential years, Republicans still have the higher turnout base, one simple reason is among college whites, non-college whites, Hispanics etc, it is the youngest among these groups that stay home in non-presidential years and the GOP does the worst with the youngest voters in all of these groups.

For example take college whites, which college whites stay home in a midterm, the younger college whites and which college whites are the most democratic, the younger ones, the same holds for all demographic groups except blacks, Republicans still have more high propensity voters.

[Annatar]

Only won the popular vote once since 1988.

Lost their House majority.

Has effectively become a personality cult built around one individual who will very likely be dead or in jail within the next few years.

Has shown no ability to get their base out to vote when said individual is not on the ballot.

Has plummeted with white, college-educated and suburban voters (the highest propensity voters).

Electoral college and Senate advantages may be slipping as states like AZ, GA, NC, TX move left.

Base is dying off, party has almost zero appeal to future generations and growing demographics.

Literally doesn't even have a platform anymore.

If we're going to ask this question about the Democratic Party, which just won the presidency against an incumbent who couldn't even get 47% of the vote, why not ask it about a party that you could make a much better case is slowly but surely declining?

Neither party is going anywhere and presidential elections will be hard-fought tossups well into the future. The Democrats are at a serious disadvantage in the Electoral College though which makes it easier for Republicans to win while losing the popular vote and this scenario will likely happen again in the next 20 years. Republicans also need to do better among younger voters in future elections although most people do tend to get more conservative as they age.

Last part is not actually true, if anything closer to the opposite:

https://www.livescience.com/2360-busting-myth-people-turn-liberal-age.html

But really it has more to do with when you are born and grow up:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/07/08/upshot/how-the-year-you-were-born-influences-your-politics.html

There is no reason to believe based on this that millennials will suddenly become conservative.

All these studies are wrong, if voters did not get more Republican as they get older the Republican party would have been finished by the late 2000's since democrats have been winning younger voters for decades, either the real life election results are all fake or these studies are fake.

[dw93]

How many asked this question after 2008? How well did that work out?

That said, they, just like the Democrats, are gonna have to do some sole searching if they want to remain competitive long term.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Depends compared to when;


The GOP is in better shape today than they were from 2006-2010 by a large margin and obviously worse than they were from 2014-2018. I would say they are in a similar position as they were from 2010-2014

[Alben Barkley]

Why was this post moved to this board but SN's post asking the same question about the Democratic Party left in the 2024 board?

[Alben Barkley]

By the way, I didn’t even get into the nastier things about the GOP I could have said like “May also lose Senate majority in no small part because conspiracy crazed tinfoil hats who believe that JFK Jr. is alive and enlightening them on 4chan have now become the mainstream base of the party, and they will refuse to vote for its candidates in protest of their state officials refusing to participate in a fascist coup.”

Somehow I doubt that "Jonestown style Kool-Aid cult" will turn out to be a long-term strategy for success for a political party.

[SingingAnalyst]

By the way, I didn’t even get into the nastier things about the GOP I could have said like “May also lose Senate majority in no small part because conspiracy crazed tinfoil hats who believe that JFK Jr. is alive and enlightening them on 4chan have now become the mainstream base of the party, and they will refuse to vote for its candidates in protest of their state officials refusing to participate in a fascist coup.”

Somehow I doubt that "Jonestown style Kool-Aid cult" will turn out to be a long-term strategy for success for a political party.

All valid points-- at least up to a point, as are the points made in your original post. BTW I voted Yes.

I am not entirely sold on the idea that conspiracy theorists et al. are the mainstream of the GOP. True, the GOP as of late has shot itself in the foot, figuratively speaking, for example by failing to come up with a coherent platform for 2020 other than "Four More Years!" (and even that is being too gentle on them). I do think such marginal thinkers (if I can call them that) are attracted to the GOP because they see them as more anti-Establishment than the Democrats, for certain. I would stop a bit short of saying they are the base or mainstream of the party.

The GOP definitely needs to do some soul-searching, and whatever the results are in GA Jan. 5, they will have plenty of time to do it. I hope enough people still care about two-party politics to try to save the party. I offered some ideas in my post "The Future of the GOP" , and a number of commentators (maybe you were one?) said essentially, "do all of the above".

Someone who cares will need to consider the fact that the strongest support for Trump in 2020 (as in 2016) came from precisely those areas that voted most strongly for George Wallace in 1968 and Richard Nixon in 1972-- home to many people who, frankly, are waiting for death or the Second Coming to relieve them of their alienation (if they even are familiar with that word/concept) and misery. Then they will need to put on their rational hats and consider this fact for what it is: an interesting statistic. Maybe someone will study the reasons why certain people are attracted to certain political ideas. Until then, the GOP needs (in my opinion) to put itself forth as a dynamic, flexible yet principled, party which believes, for the most part, in limited government, control at the smallest possible level (state vs. federal; local vs. state) and in the genius of the American people. Donald Trump did none of these things: he won once, but it was a Pyrrhic victory that damaged the party in the short run. Since the GOP has nothing like a Ronald Reagan waiting in the wings, its members will have to improvise.

The GOP may never win the Black vote, the non-Orthodox Jewish vote, the LGBTQ+ vote, etc. at least on the national level-- but they need to find a way to at least be competitive with these important voter subgroups.

[SingingAnalyst]

Only won the popular vote once since 1988.

Lost their House majority.

Has effectively become a personality cult built around one individual who will very likely be dead or in jail within the next few years.

Has shown no ability to get their base out to vote when said individual is not on the ballot.

Has plummeted with white, college-educated and suburban voters (the highest propensity voters).

Electoral college and Senate advantages may be slipping as states like AZ, GA, NC, TX move left.

Base is dying off, party has almost zero appeal to future generations and growing demographics.

Literally doesn't even have a platform anymore.

If we're going to ask this question about the Democratic Party, which just won the presidency against an incumbent who couldn't even get 47% of the vote, why not ask it about a party that you could make a much better case is slowly but surely declining?

Neither party is going anywhere and presidential elections will be hard-fought tossups well into the future. The Democrats are at a serious disadvantage in the Electoral College though which makes it easier for Republicans to win while losing the popular vote and this scenario will likely happen again in the next 20 years. Republicans also need to do better among younger voters in future elections although most people do tend to get more conservative as they age.

That is one of the most remarkable facts of politics, that has persevered as both parties have changed their regional identity over the decades and centuries.

Since the GOP's 1854 founding, all 4 times the PV loser won, it was a Republican that did so while the Democratic candidate won the PV. The times it almost happened-- 1916, 1968, 1976, 2020-- would have gone the same way. Only in 2004 did the Democrat come close to winning without the PV.

I know this post is about the GOP, but perhaps the Democrats need to bone up on their rural strategy-- and maybe pick off MS (as Carter did in 1976) or MT (as Bill Clinton did in 1992) or IN (as Obama did in 2008). Democrats should not take their 2020 win as evidence that they can win going forward without rural votes. Then again, if "it" happens again, either (1) there will be civil disorder, or (2) the EC will be modified or abolished (or both).

As for the GOP, the fact that they did better in faster-growing areas from 1950 to 2010 actually put them at a slight disadvantage (since EV allocation is based on an earlier year's census). Since 2010, it is no longer true that the GOP does best in fast-growing areas; in many cases it's the opposite (look at Georgia vs. Ohio, for example), compounding the Democrats' EC problem even more. Still, the GOP hopefully learned in 2020 that you cannot build a winning strategy solely on appealing to angry, disaffected voters.

[ChiefFireWaterMike]

By the way, I didn’t even get into the nastier things about the GOP I could have said like “May also lose Senate majority in no small part because conspiracy crazed tinfoil hats who believe that JFK Jr. is alive and enlightening them on 4chan have now become the mainstream base of the party, and they will refuse to vote for its candidates in protest of their state officials refusing to participate in a fascist coup.”

Somehow I doubt that "Jonestown style Kool-Aid cult" will turn out to be a long-term strategy for success for a political party.

And this is your problem,  your response didn't address any of the arguments, and instead went into your political bias and feelings, rather than evidence.

[Del Tachi]

Only won the popular vote once since 1988.

I think this is such a dumb point to consistently bring up.

Since 1992, Republicans have lost five presidential elections.  We would not expect them to win the popular vote in any of these. 

Of the remaining three they've won - 2000, 2004 and 2016 - they did indeed lose the popular vote in two of them.  However, that can appropriately be chalked up to the [/i]unique[/i] closeness of the 2000 race and Trump's unique lack of appeal to the national electorate.  Indeed, any Republican nominee *not named Trump would have probably won a popular vote mandate against Clinton in 2016 (and then probably won another in 2020.)

 

[slothdem]

The Republican Party is not so much in decline, as it's the party of decline.

[Obama-Biden Democrat]

Never underestimate the amount of deplorables. I thought Republicans would be locked out of power for a generation after 2008. 2 years later the Tea Party was back in full force.

[Tartarus Sauce]

Political institutions in general are in decline, including organized party structures.

[ElectionsGuy]

Gotta hand it to Alben Barkley. After being wrong for years about his electoral predictions, saying constantly Donald Trump was going to get Hoovered, or Cartered, and the 2020 elections were going to be practically an extinction event for the Republican Party, he still has the confidence to make a thread only bringing up the tired talking points that have been used since 2008 as to why the Republican party will die and never be successful in any elections ever again. You'd perhaps think, "wow, they did a lot better than I thought, maybe they're not in as bad of shape as I thought". Perhaps it's not surprising, people who bullied others for having different opinions and different predictions don't really have the capacity to do some introspection, and therefore will continue to be wrong.

A lot of those points have already been contested in this thread, but here, I'll try and do one that selectively makes Republicans feel good about the "decline" of the Democratic Party and see how well they hold up against scrutiny.

- Will hold 50 or less Senate seats since 2015
- Will hold a house majority for only 4 years out of 12 (2011-2023)
- Base keeps "losing voters". Despite all the demographics they do well with growing in size, they still somehow manage to not grow their vote share over the past 4 presidential elections.
- Electoral college, Senate, and House slips away from them due to Republican trending Midwest states, Dems doing worse in small states, and Dems packing themselves tightly into metropolitan areas.
- Has plummeted with white, non-college voters, the largest share of the electorate.
- In the last 12 years, can only win with Obama on the ballot or when Trump is an incumbent.

It was really quite difficult to come up with these, really had to do some hard research that supports my very militantly partisan political opinions.

[538Electoral]

Nah. We did amazing in downballot races

[Lechasseur]

By the way, I didn’t even get into the nastier things about the GOP I could have said like “May also lose Senate majority in no small part because conspiracy crazed tinfoil hats who believe that JFK Jr. is alive and enlightening them on 4chan have now become the mainstream base of the party, and they will refuse to vote for its candidates in protest of their state officials refusing to participate in a fascist coup.”

Somehow I doubt that "Jonestown style Kool-Aid cult" will turn out to be a long-term strategy for success for a political party.

All valid points-- at least up to a point, as are the points made in your original post. BTW I voted Yes.

I am not entirely sold on the idea that conspiracy theorists et al. are the mainstream of the GOP. True, the GOP as of late has shot itself in the foot, figuratively speaking, for example by failing to come up with a coherent platform for 2020 other than "Four More Years!" (and even that is being too gentle on them). I do think such marginal thinkers (if I can call them that) are attracted to the GOP because they see them as more anti-Establishment than the Democrats, for certain. I would stop a bit short of saying they are the base or mainstream of the party.

The GOP definitely needs to do some soul-searching, and whatever the results are in GA Jan. 5, they will have plenty of time to do it. I hope enough people still care about two-party politics to try to save the party. I offered some ideas in my post "The Future of the GOP" , and a number of commentators (maybe you were one?) said essentially, "do all of the above".

Someone who cares will need to consider the fact that the strongest support for Trump in 2020 (as in 2016) came from precisely those areas that voted most strongly for George Wallace in 1968 and Richard Nixon in 1972-- home to many people who, frankly, are waiting for death or the Second Coming to relieve them of their alienation (if they even are familiar with that word/concept) and misery. Then they will need to put on their rational hats and consider this fact for what it is: an interesting statistic. Maybe someone will study the reasons why certain people are attracted to certain political ideas. Until then, the GOP needs (in my opinion) to put itself forth as a dynamic, flexible yet principled, party which believes, for the most part, in limited government, control at the smallest possible level (state vs. federal; local vs. state) and in the genius of the American people. Donald Trump did none of these things: he won once, but it was a Pyrrhic victory that damaged the party in the short run. Since the GOP has nothing like a Ronald Reagan waiting in the wings, its members will have to improvise.

The GOP may never win the Black vote, the non-Orthodox Jewish vote, the LGBTQ+ vote, etc. at least on the national level-- but they need to find a way to at least be competitive with these important voter subgroups.

Eh, if anything, I think Trump ditching the voodoo economics garbage saved the party.

If they were still for the "small government" malarkey, they'd be a moribund party.

I think becoming more interventionist on the economy is the way to save them.

[OSR stands with Israel]

By the way, I didn’t even get into the nastier things about the GOP I could have said like “May also lose Senate majority in no small part because conspiracy crazed tinfoil hats who believe that JFK Jr. is alive and enlightening them on 4chan have now become the mainstream base of the party, and they will refuse to vote for its candidates in protest of their state officials refusing to participate in a fascist coup.”

Somehow I doubt that "Jonestown style Kool-Aid cult" will turn out to be a long-term strategy for success for a political party.

All valid points-- at least up to a point, as are the points made in your original post. BTW I voted Yes.

I am not entirely sold on the idea that conspiracy theorists et al. are the mainstream of the GOP. True, the GOP as of late has shot itself in the foot, figuratively speaking, for example by failing to come up with a coherent platform for 2020 other than "Four More Years!" (and even that is being too gentle on them). I do think such marginal thinkers (if I can call them that) are attracted to the GOP because they see them as more anti-Establishment than the Democrats, for certain. I would stop a bit short of saying they are the base or mainstream of the party.

The GOP definitely needs to do some soul-searching, and whatever the results are in GA Jan. 5, they will have plenty of time to do it. I hope enough people still care about two-party politics to try to save the party. I offered some ideas in my post "The Future of the GOP" , and a number of commentators (maybe you were one?) said essentially, "do all of the above".

Someone who cares will need to consider the fact that the strongest support for Trump in 2020 (as in 2016) came from precisely those areas that voted most strongly for George Wallace in 1968 and Richard Nixon in 1972-- home to many people who, frankly, are waiting for death or the Second Coming to relieve them of their alienation (if they even are familiar with that word/concept) and misery. Then they will need to put on their rational hats and consider this fact for what it is: an interesting statistic. Maybe someone will study the reasons why certain people are attracted to certain political ideas. Until then, the GOP needs (in my opinion) to put itself forth as a dynamic, flexible yet principled, party which believes, for the most part, in limited government, control at the smallest possible level (state vs. federal; local vs. state) and in the genius of the American people. Donald Trump did none of these things: he won once, but it was a Pyrrhic victory that damaged the party in the short run. Since the GOP has nothing like a Ronald Reagan waiting in the wings, its members will have to improvise.

The GOP may never win the Black vote, the non-Orthodox Jewish vote, the LGBTQ+ vote, etc. at least on the national level-- but they need to find a way to at least be competitive with these important voter subgroups.

Eh, if anything, I think Trump ditching the voodoo economics garbage saved the party.

If they were still for the "small government" malarkey, they'd be a moribund party.

I think becoming more interventionist on the economy is the way to save them.

Except Trump's domestic policy has arguably been the most right-wing president we have had since the 1920s. He hasnt really done anything that would qualify him as more moderate on domestic policy/economics than Reagan or W Bush really at all.

Reagan used the regulatory state to expand healthcare coverage, did the Montreal protocol , raised capital gains taxes.

W Bush did Medicare Part D, No Child Left Behind, and expanded the welfare state by a larger amount than any President since LBJ.

Trump hasnt really done anything that qualifies himself as more moderate on domestic policy or economic policy than Reagan. Also people liked the job Trump did economically and most people think his economic policies worked and he was more of a supply-sider than even Reagan was. Even on trade both Reagan and W Bush did tarrifs too so even on trade Trump hasnt really been different than Reagan or W Bush.

The GOP had a bad run from 2006-2013 sure but much of it was cause 2006/2008 was a fallout from the Bush years. 2012 was that Obama ran an extremely good campaign, its difficult to knock of an incumbent when things are seemingly getting better(As bad as the economy was in 2012 it was better than things were in 2009/2010), when you cant run on your signature accomplishment as governor, having a fringe right element seemingly take over a large section of the party and Romney not running a good campaign.


2016 the GOP won cause its extremely hard to win 3 consecutive terms in the white house especially with someone as flawed of a candidate as Hillary, and when after 8 years in the White House only 36% of American think the economy is good(the number in 2020 was 49% so less people thought the economy was good in 2016 than in 2020). Plus there were multiple crises happening abroad which goes against the incumbent party after 8 years in the white house.

For proof of the fact that Trump is an overrated campaigner is the fact that he underperformed the down-ballot GOP both in 2016 and in 2020.