COUNCIL BLUFFS, IOWA — Former President Donald Trump lost the 2016 popular vote to the most unpopular politician of a generation and lost the 2020 presidential election to an elderly man who barely left his house.
After losing, Trump refused to accept his defeat, hired crackpot lawyers who spun increasingly insane conspiracy theories, and eventually agitated a mob to storm the Capitol and try to kill his vice president, Mike Pence.
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Now the former president faces two felony trials. One of the two cases against Trump is weak, but the underlying fact is his alleged cheating on his third wife (he cheated on the first two, as well). The stronger felony case alleges not merely that Trump took classified presidential records as his own after leaving office, but also that he blatantly obstructed the federal government’s efforts to reclaim these documents.
All of this is to say that Trump has plenty of weaknesses that might make him a less-than-ideal presidential nominee in 2024.
Yet Trump is the clear front-runner for the Republican nomination. He is at 50% in nearly every primary poll, about 30 percentage points ahead of second-place Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL).
What are Trump’s supporters thinking? What do they make of his vices, shortcomings, and flaws?
“Trump has faults,” Jason Lieber of Council Bluffs said before Trump’s rally. “We all do.”
Sherry Carlson, another Trump supporter from Council Bluffs, said she supports Trump because “he’s a godly man. He’s Christian.” So I asked about his cheating on his wife.
“I don’t care,” Carlson replied. “So did Bill Clinton.” Carlson went on to say, “There’s a lot of presidents that made mistakes. I think it was Teddy Roosevelt was a cross-dresser.” (I can find no evidence corroborating this claim.)
Gary Elgan, Chris Harter, and Ray Owens stood together in the Mid-American Center, waiting for Trump to take the stage. When I asked about the facts behind the two felony cases, all three men dismissed the idea.
“They've all done it,” Elgan said instantly. “They're all crooked.”
“What’d they do to Bill Clinton with Monica Lewinsky?” Owens said. “He was already president. What [Trump] did on his own time is his own business.”
“Yeah,” piped in his friend Chris Harter, “we all got some things we won’t tell.” The men laughed.
Some Trump supporters had critiques of their guy, though. Lieber disliked Trump’s continued focus on 2020. He said he’d like to get Trump talking about “what are you focused on for the next four years, rather than focusing on ‘it was stolen.’ Because there’s nothing you can go back and do about it now.”
Don Robinson of Clarinda, Iowa, worries about Trump’s electability. “I love Trump, but I'm not sure he can win the election because they'll make a circus out of it. You know the media and the courts and the lawsuits.” Robinson granted that Trump is his own enemy in this regard. “Trump coulda been more responsible in his actions,” Robinson said. “He brought a lot of this on himself."
“I kinda doubt that he can win” the general election in 2024, Carl King of Bennington, Nebraska, granted, “but I wish he would. I don't know if he can do it.” King is nevertheless supporting Trump 100% in the primaries.
Rod Carlson, the husband of Sherry, was glad Trump contested the 2020 elections, but he conceded it might be an electoral negative in 2024. “Maybe it could have done it a little different way. That's Trump's way, though: loud and obnoxious,” he said. Would Trump benefit from being less loud and obnoxious? “I like it about him,” Rod Carlson replied, “but I think it might benefit him with the voters.”
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Most of the Trump supporters, however, believed that any Republican would be under the same sort of fire as Trump.
“It doesn’t matter who you get in there,” Michelle Schroeder said. “Democrats are going to tear whoever it is apart.”