Whither the Post-Trump Republican Party?

But her e-mails!

I don't know if Donald Trump will be the Republican Party's candidate for President in 2024.  Certainly he looks like the most likely prospect today.  But things might come up.  He may be to old and feeble to run by 2024.  Or loss of his Twitter account my turn out to by like Sampson losing his hair. Or he may lose his luster when out of power, or just lose interest.  

But even if Trump is the 2024 candidate, he will be term-limited out by 2028.  And if he somehow overcomes that, he will most likely be too senile and decrepit to take seriously by 2028.  And even if he is still in the running in 2028, sooner or later he will die.  All of which means that sooner or later, the Republican Party will have to figure out what to do post-Trump.

My own guess is that a post-Trump Republican Party will not be patrimonial in the same way that Trump is, but that it will be authoritarian.  Specifically, it will want to establish a one-party state -- not a de jure one party state like a Communist or fascist country, but a de facto one party state like Mexico in the heyday of the PRI.  In other words, it will not attempt to outlaw the Democratic Party, but it will attempt to rig the system to ensure that Democrats cannot win the Presidency or a majority in either house of Congress.  Republicans will most likely concede some states to Democrats, but try to establish one-party rule in as many states as possible.

Presumably Republicans will justify this to themselves by arguing that Democrats' big government ways are such an intolerable threat to liberty that we will just have to abandon democracy and rig the system to protect freedom.  Or maybe they will argue that we are a constitutional republic rather than a democracy and therefore states are allowed to run elections any way they like, including in ways that rig the system.  Or maybe that votes for Democrats are illegitimate by definition because Democrats illegitimately bribe minority voters with government benefits and thereby enslave them.  (Republicans appear to sincerely believe this).

So, how will Republicans go about it?  I do not expect any more violent insurrections, and false reporting of election results seems to be a bridge too far.  But Republicans are widely seeking to restrict voting access by Democratic voters.  They are gerrymandering federal and state districts to ensure that Republicans will always control federal and state legislatures.  They may seek to have state legislatures, rather than voters, choose presidential electors.  And no doubt there will be other attempts to rig the system at the state level.

At the federal level, I do not expect the next Republican President to be a patrimonialist like Trump, but I do expect him/her to continue and expand Trump's violations of the Hatch Act, which forbids the use of government resources to advance political campaigns.  Trump and his appointees routinely used federal resources for political purposes and shrugged off any complaints as inside baseball that no one outside the beltway cared about.  We may be confident that if a Democrat violates the Hatch Act, Republicans will raise holy hell about it and make sure that people outside the beltway do know and care.  I would also expect Republicans in Congress to aggressively investigate and publicize any scandal, however insignificant, involving Democrats, while blocking any investigation of Republican scandals.  And I would expect a Republican Department of Justice to pursue actions to obstruct voting by Democratic voters and be highly partisan in its prosecutions.  But the Hatch Act is the biggie.  I expect our next Republican President to be more competent than Trump, and less patrimonial.  That means that I do not expect the next Republican President to treat the federal government as his/her personal property, but I do expect our next Republican President to aggressively subvert the Hatch act and endeavor to turn the federal government into an instrument for advancing the fortunes of he Republican Party.

And to the extent that the attempt is successful, I would expect it to be profoundly subversive of the Republican Party's stated goals and ideology.  After all, if the Republican Party is successful in turning the federal government into an instrument of its political power, it will lose all incentive to shrink the federal government.  Who would shrink the source of their power?

Furthermore, I get that the Republican Party had considerable success this last election by denouncing all government services as mere stepping stones to a Communist dictatorship, and promised to free its voters from the burden of government to succeed or fail on their own. But that message is always more popular as an abstract principle than in the flesh and blood. People who profess to see all government services as a form of enslavement are nonetheless very eager to get their $2,000 COVID checks, and generally eager to see COVID relief of all kinds.  And even if we dismiss this as an extraordinary reaction to extraordinary circumstances, there is a longstanding tradition in this country of opposing all government services except mine.  

For right now, Republicans may be able to maintain power by raising hysterical fears of the Democrats and what they would do with power.  But the longer and more strongly Republicans are able to consolidate their one-party state, the less menacing that threat is going to look.  And in order the maintain their power, Republicans will have to buy off constituents with some sort of goodies.  You know, what they see Democrats as illegitimately doing.  

In short, one party systems invariably either split into rival parties or become corrupt patronage networks due to the lack of challenge and accountability.  I do not expect the Republican Party to become big enough to split at any time in the foreseeable future.  I can only assume, then, that if Republicans successfully turn the US into a de facto one party state, we will end up just as corrupt and patronage-based as any other one party state.