Jay Weber show transcript 3-2-21 7:10am

I did a segment on Donald Trump at CPAC yesterday, and got some emails from listeners as a result...

And several listeners said: I don’t know about you, Jay, but that sure sounds like a guy who is running in 2024...

That’s interesting-but I got the opposite vibe.

Do you want to see Trump run in 2024 and do you think he will?

Those are two separate questions. You can answer either, or both, but these emails got me wondering where the larger audience is on the question of whether they want trump to run in 2024, and if so, do you think he will?

My belief is that these listeners who emailed me and said: that sure sounds like a guy who is running...

Are probably people who hope he runs? They might be injecting some of their own wishful thinking into what they heard from president trump at CPAC.

Because- yes- I heard a speech in which the man is not done influencing the party, and who still wants to maintain he didn’t lose that election.

I heard a man who wants to make sure the historians and the rest of us give him credit for four years of great and historical accomplishments.

I said it for nearly his entire term: Donald Trump is the single most effective president I’ve ever seen in my lifetime, and he might be the most effective ever...in terms of getting things done and keeping campaign promises.

It was a heck of a four year ride, and I wish it could have gone on for eight.

And so, I heard a man who wants history to ‘get it right’.

But I also heard a man who only teased about running for a third time. And I heard a man who carefully parsed his message that ‘his movement’ was far from over...and how he was going to continue to be engaged in the Republican Party and making ‘Trumpism’ a lasting platform for the party...

But I did not hear a man who really sounded like he was running in 2024.Donald trump will be 78 years old, after all, and he’s got a wife, family, and friends who likely feel like they’ve all been put thru enough. Had to endure so much hatred and ugliness over the last four years that they probably want no part of it...for a second go-round.

What I heard in that speech was a man who wants to try to be a king-maker in the 2022 election and most likely- only play that role in 2024- and not run himself.

I answered the first question: do I think trump will run again?

No. But I admit-it’s a wide open question and I don’t believe Donald Trump himself knows the answer to it yet.

He is probably going to be mulling and questioning and ruminating over it for quite a while yet, before he makes a final decision he can live with.

Right now? I’d lean no.

As to the second question: do I want him to run again? I’ll shock some of you in the audience, no doubt, but...no. Not really.

And don’t get me wrong: if he runs again and wins the nomination I’ll be strongly behind him, but I don’t think he could win in a general election match up again, unless that match up was maybe: Trump v. Biden again.

The American people-might-opt for more trump after four years of Biden failures. But let’s face it- Joe Biden is almost certainly-not-going to run for a second term. He will be 82 years old, and even feebler minded than he is now.

And that’s going to inject the question of ‘age’ directly into the 2024 conversation.

If Joe Biden is, and was, too old to do this job, and he’s now proved it....well...trump would be 78 in 2024. Exactly the age Biden was, when he won.

But more than that- the majority opinion in this country seems to be a sense of relief that the turmoil of the trump era is over. Even if half of the country doesn’t like Biden...

And even with that number likely to grow every day, as Biden and the democrats do more and more radical things.

Most Americans- in 2024- even if they want Biden out-aren’t going to want Trump to be the antidote to Bidenism.

And I’m just being honest. I think trump could win the GOP nomination again pretty easily, but I don’t think he could win the general.

Moreover-I want to see some new blood. I want to see someone like Ron DeSantis rise up from one of the states to lead the party and the movement into the future. We have some rising stars of the sort that could appeal to the trump-minded voter, and yet not bring all of the controversy and baggage that comes along with trump.

But no, I -did not-hear a one-term president sounding like he’s got unfinished business, in that Trump CPAC speech.

I heard more of a venerable elder, making it clear that his time of influence and power hasn’t passed, yet. Not that he really wants to be tribal chief again. He just wants to pick the next one.

That’s what I heard, in that speech.

I have talked about what trump’s plan for 2022 is: he plans to endorse a candidate in every open seat and every high profile race around the country: from senate and congressional races, right down to gubernatorial and statewide races if they fit his mission...

And he wants to play kingmaker.

He wants to prove to the country that his influence is great, and the voters take his judgment seriously.

And maybe-if his endorsed candidates pull off overwhelming wins, and it is clear that trump influenced voter turnout to a huge degree in 2022...maybe that would tip him in the direction of trying to run again in 2024.

But I didn’t hear him vowing to do so.

Maybe he wants to keep the fires stoked in the movement and is going to attempt to hand the reigns off to don junior in a few years, and ‘gift him’ frontrunner status.

That’s also something he could be up to. I don’t know.

photo credit: Getty Images

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