Why Trump’s Candidates Are Likely To Win The Mid-Terms And What That Could Mean For The World

As the US mid-term elections inch closer what is clear is that the race will be decided not as much by President Biden but by Donald Trump. The reason I focus on Trump and not Biden as the deal breaker is because he is a phenomenon, a politician that doesn’t seem to follow any of the conventional rules. Trump can tell lies, be unaffected by sex scandals (and still pull in a sizeable portion of the woman vote) be friends openly with Russian President Vladmir Putin (despite the pro-Ukraine position of the White House and much of the Western world at the moment) and still be a serious contender not just for the mid-terms, where Republican candidates are running on his name, but for the presidency. In fact, by removing with seemingly little opposition – candidates that don’t support him – he seems to have all but ensured that.

Why Trump's Candidates Are Likely To Win

Here are three key reasons why Trump is winning the perception battle and why his candidates have a good chance to win both Houses.

·??????Trump doesn’t care about world affairs and in this I argue he is in tune with a large number of American voters both Republican and even some Democrats. ?While America has carried out a number of operations throughout the 20th and 21st century, the country’s superior air power and geographical distance has ensured that they do not have to deal with their neighbours such as other countries do. For instance, while European nations have to get on (to an extent with other) India has to get on with China and Pakistan (again to an extent) because they are neighbours, the US does not have to worry about any of this. Mexico and Canada have no issues with the US and are much weaker nations economically. This is why the Monroe Doctrine was in place for so long as a key lynchpin of US foreign policy and this is probably why Trump’s slogan of ‘America First’ resonates. This is also why Biden will struggle to sell Ukraine to the American voter as the war continues.

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·??????The Democrats and President Biden realise that concepts like liberalism, globalisation and rule of law is a hard sell. In a heavily televised country like the US, catchphrases rule and Trump is a master at them. From the ‘Mexican Wall’ to ‘Lock her up’ to ‘Sleepy Joe’ for Biden, he dominates. Biden, like Hillary before him is trying to defend abstract concepts like liberalisation, rule of law, globalisation on television which is hard to do. The US does not even have televised parliamentary sessions as India, the UK and other European countries do where these issues could be discussed with some depth. Instead, he must condense these abstract issues into soundbites, something that does not resonate easily with US voters.

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·??????The structure of the US electoral system means a presidential candidate is always in electoral mode. This is why the Democrats may be worried - Biden has no tangible wins. The war in Ukraine is ongoing, the assassination of Ayman al-Zawahiri is old news and Zawahiri’s name does not catch the same attention as Bin Laden did for the US voter. Instead, Biden is stuck with the perception of being the president who ran out of Afghanistan, who was snubbed by MbS, and who is responsible for high gas prices. The fact that even American oil producers are ignoring his cry to drill more show him as ‘weak.’ ?(https://www.ft.com/content/2d92c841-0a66-464a-9762-02994ac41f7d)

This factor will be very important in a US election where a tough guy persona is important at all times. Trump has managed that very successfully. His repeated message to repudiate the election results, if they are not in his favour, makes the narrative and the airtime all about his message with the Democrats playing defence. It also makes him look like a person who sets his own rules – something that has been very attractive to most American voters – as US elections are increasingly about showmanship, spectacle and the economy with everything else following afterward.

?What This Could Mean For The Global Order

A Trump victory (I label the mid-term election victories as victories for Trump since most of the candidates are his) sends a very contrary message to that of Biden to the world. Both Saudi Arabia and Russia will rejoice as deadlocked Houses may mean Biden will be forced to turn inwards to fight off cases against his son Hunter Biden. Europe too may lose faith in the US president who would effectively become a ‘lame duck.’ China could be emboldened further from the deadlock, and we may find a more adventurous President Xi in the region and elsewhere in the world. What happens to Iran remains to be seen but it is safe to say with a Republican House (or Houses) there will be no JCPOA deal which is something Tehran believes will happen anyway, and so it is selling its drones fairly openly to Russia strengthening a loose Russia-China-Iran (RCI) alliance.

For India, not much will change, though Trump has been quicker than Biden to make an outreach to the Indian-American community, and India is already furious with the US administration for allowing the US ambassador to Pakistan Donald Blome to visit PoK and call it ‘Azad Kashmir.’ The Biden administration tried to course correct with the president calling Pakistan the most “dangerous” nation in the world, but it was clumsy and awkward, and he had to soon walk back on his statement.

The result is that the world may get used to functioning without a strong US at the epicentre of world affairs and what that means remains to be seen. There are too many variables to adequately predict what will happen going forward but it is perhaps safe to say that the US will have a harder time persuading allies such as Europe, the Quad and other multilateral organisations to keep together on a common path and given that the lines between the Republicans and Democrats are as divided as they are, international commitments such as the one on the climate will suffer as each party will look to deny the other a win. With internal squabbling, an angry public, uncertain allies, and a global recession it is unlikely that the US can command world affairs as it used to. Not for the next two years anyway. ??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????