OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
A noted Republican political consultant and author of several books about Ronald Reagan’s presidency has laid out what he believes is a winning strategy for former President Donald Trump should he decide to run again in 2024.
Writing at Townhall.com, Craig Shirley noted that Reagan ‘cleaned house’ between his 1976 GOP primary loss to incumbent President Gerald Ford and his comeback win in 1980 against then-President Jimmy Carter, decisions, he said, helped propel ‘The Gipper’ to victory.
“At a critical point in the 1980 campaign, Ronald Reagan had enough and cleaned house of his senior political advisors including campaign manager John Sears. One staffer would later recall, ‘Ronald Reagan would not have come so close in 1976 had he not hired John Sears; and Ronald Reagan would not have won the GOP nomination had he not fired John Sears in 1980,'” Shirley began.
“As it does on so many occasions, history repeats itself. Like Reagan before him, Donald Trump now must clean house if he hopes to make a serious political comeback,” he continued.
Shirley argued that Trump’s 2016 victory was mostly due to his own campaign strategy and relying heavily on being a true outsider candidate to attract massive crowds and free media airtime because his candidacy was treated “as a novelty.”
In addition, Trump “had the good fortune of running against the worst presidential candidate in recent history” — Hillary Clinton — and “accordingly devastated” her in each of their debates.
Trump also followed a “sound state-by-state strategy” that led him to victory in states that were blue or trending blue including Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania while “Clinton ignored” them and took them for granted.
But in 2020, however, Shirley said Trump’s loss “was mostly the doing of bad consultants and advisors.”
“I know because I know many of them. Then some have the nerve to write their own autobiographies as if they themselves are important,” he added.
Shirley then presented what lays before Trump ahead of the next presidential cycle thus far:
As we approach 2024, all the right conditions are there for Trump to win again should he decide to run. Joe Biden has proven to be an unmitigated disaster in every aspect of his presidency. Crime is rampant, inflation has skyrocketed, shelves are empty, and the southern border between America and Mexico is practically nonexistent. In the realm of foreign affairs, Biden shamed the country when he disgracefully allowed the Taliban to take back control of Afghanistan and abandoned hundreds of Americans still stranded in that godforsaken country, while simultaneously allowing our adversaries to run circles around us. Don’t get me started on the stupidity of Ukraine.
In short, Trump has the perfect recipe to win again, but all that means nothing if he doesn’t get his own house in order first.
Shirley recounted how many years ago he worked for the New York Racing Association before recalling a saying he used to hear a lot at the track: “A good jockey cannot make a bad horse win, but a bad jockey can make a good horse lose.”
“Campaigns are fresh and campaigns are stale. Campaigns need new personnel, new ideas and new initiatives. And Trump’s is no exception. As my old boss Terry Dolan was fond of saying, ‘never forget the first three letters of the word ‘consultant.’ And yet pollsters and consultants have become millionaires out of their malpractice,” Shirley wrote.
As for who Trump should embrace, Shirley cited former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, whom he described as a “good friend” but also someone who “is perhaps the smartest person in American politics today.”
Gingrich is someone who is “polished, articulate, knowledgeable of laws and regulation,” and able to provide the former president “and by extension the entire GOP with the ideas they’ll need to gain control of Washington if they win the House, Senate, and White House back in the coming years.”
Citing “the Rudy Gulianis and Sydney Powells of the world,” Shirley recommended that Trump keep at arm’s length “those who bring needless controversy and buffoonery to his brand within his circle.
“He dosen’t need an endless menagerie of political consultants who only know how to lose elections,” he continued, adding that Trump should avoid bringing in “anyone else who thinks it will benefit Trump to relitigate the 2020 election.”
“That election is said and done, and Trump’s primary focus should be looking to the future and how he can win there rather than harebrained schemes to overturn Joe Biden’s win that are likely doomed to failure,” he wrote, adding that the vast majority of Americans care far more about so-called ‘kitchen table issues’ like inflation, gas prices, and the ongoing supply chain crisis — all issues that impact them directly and daily.
“Joe Biden is the worst president on the books since Jimmy Carter. He goes into a town and bridges collapse. Regardless of who ends up being the Republican standard bearer, that person will need competent advisors for their campaign. At the end of the day Americans want competency, and surrounding himself with competent people will go a long way for Trump when it comes time for Americans to cast their vote in the next presidential election,” Shirley wrote.
He concludes: “Biden has given Trump a target-rich environment and he does not need to be distracted by bad pollsters and bad consultants.”
