Stop taking the Trump bait

[PSOL]

A significantly bad decision in the Trump 2020 campaign was the supposed focus on certain candidates on the Democratic party’s left with no chance to become the nominee. First it was the hyperfixation on Warren, then to a more subdued extent on Sanders even after South Carolina. There was no way in hell any of those two would have won, especially Sanders, yet the Trump campaign still focused on Sanders way past his prime instead of attacking Biden

Today, with Trump a political nonfactor and even voters who vote Republican souring on him, Democrats are continuing to talk about Trump. While Trump did dampen down Republicans in many races on the state level in the midterms, there was also the fact that the Republican party faced immense backlash for Roe’s repeal and that the party has yet to recover from 2020–so that excuse cannot be made.

Now, it is even less excusable with DeSantis a clear favorite and the fact that the Trump cult has all but been taken down many pegs. I fail to see Democrats being able to successfully tie DeSantis to Trump even with the absolute certainty Trump will endorse DeSantis, as he doesn’t carry himself around as a MAGA Republican yet is skilled in getting their support and helping Republicans do well with turning out conservative minorities who don’t vote.

[Хahar 🤔]

I believe that "begging the question" is the term for what's happening in this thread.

[emailking]

lol before any of that he tried to bribe Zelenskyy to make up a Biden scandal.

[Kleine Scheiße]

2O24 IT COME'S DOWN TO ONE MAN...The only one who can fixing it its DAVE PORT NOY

[Xing]

I reject the premise that DeSantis is a “clear favorite.” I would honestly love to never think about Donald Trump again, but when, from my standpoint, he’s the most likely person to be the Republican nominee and the second most likely person is a Trump wannabe and Trumpist in all but name, my hands are kind of tied.

[Darthpi – Anti-Florida Activist]

[Ljube]

I reject the premise that DeSantis is a “clear favorite.” I would honestly love to never think about Donald Trump again, but when, from my standpoint, he’s the most likely person to be the Republican nominee and the second most likely person is a Trump wannabe and Trumpist in all but name, my hands are kind of tied.

Donald Trump is not the most likely person to be the Republican nominee.
Donald Trump keeps losing support which is all his fault.

[Spectator]

I reject the premise that DeSantis is a “clear favorite.” I would honestly love to never think about Donald Trump again, but when, from my standpoint, he’s the most likely person to be the Republican nominee and the second most likely person is a Trump wannabe and Trumpist in all but name, my hands are kind of tied.

Donald Trump is not the most likely person to be the Republican nominee.
Donald Trump keeps losing support which is all his fault.

Citation needed

[BlueSwan]

I do agree that focusing too much on Trump, who is probably unlikely to be the nominee, is counterproductive.

I disagree that the Trump campaign 2020 was focused on Sanders. Warren, yes. Sanders, no. They were much more focused on Biden, but had problems doing it succesfully.

[ProgressiveModerate]

As others have said here, I don't think there's enough to say DeSantis is a "clear favorite" or anything close to it even this far out. Primaries tend to be more volatile, he hasn't declared anything yet, and we don't know how exactly he'll define himself.

I do think you make a good point though about focusing too much on Trump; I honestly think that's why Dems really suffered down ballot in 2020, with Rs especially at more local levels tending to outperform Trump regardless of whether or not they were "more moderate". At the same time, Rs were very good at blanketing the Democratic Party as a threat to safety and freedom and stuff.

In 2022, we saw the reverse, where Rs focused a bit too heavily on Biden whereas Dems were very effective about painting the Rs as a whole as problematic.

Especially given the brutal Senate map that's up, Dems really need to make sure they attack nit just the nominee but the party as a whole, cause even just a slight Dem underperformance of Pres partisanship in key Senate races could be very costly.