Anti-Trump Conservatives

For his part, Jonah Goldberg makes it clear that his conception of a third party fits within the tradition of defector parties designed to punish the parent party. The new party, according to Goldberg, should “play the role of spoiler by garnering enough conservative votes in the general election to throw the election to the Democrat. … The point is to cause the GOP some pain for its descent into asininity.”

Goldberg also proposes that the new conservative party make an undiluted Reaganism its philosophical standard. Presumably, this would mean a greater attentiveness to fiscal rectitude; beyond its lack of fiscal rectitude, though, Trumpism is either so malleable or so indebted to traditional conservative issue positions that a third party will find it hard to establish clear points of distinction on major issues.

As strong as the case against Trump’s character and behavior may be, one has to go back to the Whigs in the 1830s to find a successful party built primarily around opposition to a political figure’s comportment (in their case, it was Andrew Jackson). An Evan McMullin-like sequel seems unlikely to fare much better in 2024. The growing leftward extremism from the Democratic Party also means that Republican voters will be more likely to stick with the GOP’s candidates. In the same way, as long as the specter of Trump’s possible return haunts the political landscape, Democrats will also be reluctant to take a flier on a third party.