As John Weaver, the top strategist for John Kasich’s presidential campaign, told the Guardian: “In 2018, I am expecting no matter what happens to Trump that we will have a lot of mini-Trumps all over the country” running for office.
This is not just due to Trump’s success or a desire to emulate his uniquely belligerent and bombastic style. Instead, as Geoffrey Kabaservice, who wrote Rule and Ruin, the definitive history of the collapse of the moderate wing of the Republican party, told the Guardian: “I think [Trump] is revealing that a lot of the conservatism that came in with Ronald Reagan is past its sell-by date and a lot of it doesn’t speak to the needs and desires” of Republican voters.
He noted: “In hindsight, Trump has shown many traditional GOP voters don’t care that much about traditional conservatism.”
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