I have not been wrong about much during this election cycle and the Trump indictment debacle, but boy did I get it wrong regarding the impact indictments would have on the Trump campaign.
I was dug in firmly that once indictments started to come down and the reality that Trump could be behind bars before the general election became apparent, I thought for sure that voters would move away from him and toward DeSantis.
That has not happened. Actually, the complete opposite has happened, reported NPR.
Booming
The indictments, for Trump, have been a boom on two different fronts.
Right after the 2022 cycle had ended, Trump and DeSantis were tied. DeSantis lost that momentum by putting his announcement off until just a few weeks ago, and in the meantime, Trump has lapped him several times over.
Not only have Trump’s numbers improved, but he has also gotten a nice fundraising boost every time an indictment comes down.
This goes behind Republicans remaining loyal, by the way.
We are seeing more and more independents call these indictments political attacks and siding with Trump, the complete opposite of what Democrats wanted to see here.
There is one more factor of this, and it was something that Trump set the tone on very early.
The two top contenders aside from Trump, Ron DeSantis, and Vivek Ramaswamy, have not aggressively criticized Trump on the indictments.
Trump set a tone from the very first indictment that if you did not side with him, you were a RINO, and conservatives bought that line, so they know if they attack him on this front, it would generate a counterattack by Trump that would draw negative attention to them.
Ramaswamy has actually become a Trump operative, sucking up to Trump every chance he gets, and it is working because Trump has refused to attack him. Trump knows that every vote for Ramaswamy is a vote that DeSantis does not get, so Trump wants him around as long as possible.
In the latest polling, Ramaswamy has made up significant ground, reported Fox News. I, however, cannot stress enough that this man is a fraud. He is not the conservative he is getting everyone to believe, and you only need to look at his recent statements on pardoning Hunter Biden and legalizing hard drugs in this country to see that.
Unless the conservative agenda has changed on those fronts, this man is not to be trusted.
Just a few weeks ago, I figured this would be a head-to-head match between Trump and DeSantis by Super Tuesday. Now, if Ramaswamy can keep this momentum, there is no way he drops out before Super Tuesday.
If that holds true, this race will be over by the time they count the Super Tuesday votes and Trump will have a very easy road to the nomination.
