Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: President Trump is convening Republicans in Dallas tonight for a highly unusual, two-day convention, with less than two months to go until the midterms.
The gathering, which has come to be called Trump-a-palooza by Republicans and Democrats alike, will place the president and his policies at the center of Republicans’ midterm messaging. (Follow the reporting from my colleagues on the ground in Dallas here.)
It’s not clear whether this will help Republicans whose battleground races could determine control of Congress — and it’s not clear, either, how much Trump cares whether or not it does.
As the confab kicks off in Dallas, I asked my colleague Maggie Haberman, a White House reporter and an expert on the president, to tell us what she knows about Trump’s midterm approach. Here’s our conversation:
In a midterm year, a president often travels the country to help his party. Trump has stayed pretty close to Washington, although you’ve reported that that’s about to change. How much is he thinking about the midterms?
This is one of those questions where the answer might change depending on when you ask it. For the most part, according to all of our reporting, he is not spending a ton of his mind share on the races themselves.
He’s been spending a lot of time on his legacy projects for himself — not legislation, but the triumphal arch, the ballroom on the White House complex, his goldification of the Oval Office and other parts of the West Wing.
He’s been telling advisers, according to our reporting, that people should be doing more to defend what he sees as his many accomplishments, which is why there are now some videos circulating from his team that focus on those topics.
Is that what he wants the midterms to be — a referendum on him, and a chance to buttress his accomplishments? Does he see the midterms as another legacy project?
I think that attaches a bit too much strategery to how he’s looking at it, to quote Will Ferrell pretending to quote President George W. Bush. Trump was indifferent to the midterms in 2018, when he and his son-in-law and formal adviser at the time, Jared Kushner, believed they would benefit from having Democrats as a foil, but also as a group they could make deals with.
The president now basically views himself as untouchable. He has the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity ruling that protects sitting presidents from criminal liability for official acts, and he has said he will pardon anyone, in his words, who has come within a certain radius of the Oval Office.
Remember, he has told people that he is “proud” that Republicans don’t do as well when he’s not on the ballot. THAT is the legacy project for him.
This brings us to his midterm convention. A lot of Republicans might like to be out campaigning, but instead, they’re in Dallas. Who is this for?
There’s no question this was conceived of as something enjoyable for Trump, and multiple advisers to the president have conceded that privately. A number of Republicans facing tough campaigns are staying away.
It’s a big party for Trump at a moment when a lot of Republicans are anxious about what his policies, including on trade and the war with Iran, mean for the economy and for their chances of getting elected. Can they expect help from the president? And in what form?
A great question, and one that was not answered by the $10 million laid out from his super PAC, MAGA Inc., in the last few days to support Ken Paxton, the party’s controversial Senate candidate in Texas. That amount of money is not going to help other groups figure out how to budget their own spending.
However, Teddy Schleifer, Shane Goldmacher and I reported earlier today that a new mystery PAC, is tied to Trump’s political orbit and appears to be a vehicle through which his super PAC is now spending much more of the hundreds of millions of dollars that it has on hand. This week, the new group reserved at least $49 million in advertising to aid Republicans in key Senate races in states like Ohio, Michigan and New Hampshire.
It’s the biggest midterm-related outlay so far from a pot of funds that Trump has referred to, while speaking with reporters, as “my money.”
Then there’s his promised travel, although how much of it he will do remains an open question. Someone like Senator Susan Collins of Maine, who has her own political identity, almost certainly would rather not spend a ton of time with the president. But since Republicans mostly see this as a turnout election, and not a persuasion election, the majority of Republican candidates will make the most of it.
There is another way Trump could shape the midterms. His administration is also working to restrict mail voting. How focused is Trump on this, and how do he and his advisers think it will affect the elections in November?
There’s the significant X-factor of what he is attempting to do with restricting mail-in voting based on what he keeps claiming, but never proving, is widespread voter fraud significant enough to affect the elections he’s made such claims about. He’s extremely focused on that, and his rallying cry of “rigged” elections, which he has used both when he’s won (2016 general election) and when he’s lost (2020 and the 2016 Iowa caucuses).
Not everyone in his group of advisers favors approaching it this way, but regardless, it is potentially going to inject confusion into the process.
This interview was edited and condensed.
A convention in name only
There is something missing from Trump’s midterm gathering, Reid Epstein writes: any semblance of the official party business that forms the backbone of the traditional conventions you might be used to seeing in a presidential election year.
There will be no roll call. No voting delegates. No wonky subcommittees. Instead, the two-day gathering is basically a pair of six-hour advertisements for Trump and for Republicans.
If you are tuning in, here are five things Reid thinks you should look out for.
ABOUT LAST NIGHT …
New Hampshire’s Senate race is expected to be tight, as I wrote over the weekend. Jeanne Shaheen, the Democrat who now holds the seat, is retiring, and Republicans think they have a shot at flipping her seat. Last night, voters picked the candidates who will run to replace her.
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Democrats chose Chris Pappas, a moderate congressman. Republicans went with John E. Sununu, a former senator whom Shaheen unseated nearly two decades ago.
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There was also a compelling primary in the First Congressional District. Stefany Shaheen, the daughter of the retiring senator, claimed the Democratic nomination. She’ll face Anthony DiLorenzo, a Trump-backed businessman.
In a year when so many primaries have featured insurgent progressive victories and shocking upsets, the results were surprising in their own way. Read more of my takeaways here.
LIL’ RHODY
Voters in Rhode Island are casting ballots today. (Yes, it’s a Wednesday. Primary season never rests!) There’s a Senate race, and a few statewide offices. But the main event is the Democratic primary for governor, where the incumbent could be in trouble.
Gov. Dan McKee, 75, is seeking a second term. He’s running against a challenger who almost beat him in 2022, Helena Foulkes, a health care executive. And this time around, he has some baggage: His abrupt closing of a bridge in 2023. McKee shut the bridge down for safety reasons, but Rhode Islanders are still fuming over the disruption, my colleague Jenna Russell reported. A recent poll from Emerson College showed Foulkes leading by 15 points.
Polls close tonight at 8 p.m. Eastern. You can follow the results here.
one last thing
It’s not just MAGA Inc. that’s giving out money. Trump himself doled out $45,000 in Christmas gifts to a select group of White House staff members — including to Natalie Harp, the ever-present aide whom some Democrats are trying to turn into a midterm punchline.
Taylor Robinson contributed reporting.
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