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President Donald Trump is hitting the road again in a whistle-stop tour to bolster candidates in the upcoming November midterms. On Thursday, Oct. 1, he will headline in Durant, OK, followed the next day by a rally in Mobile, AL. And this is just the start of his 35-stop tour. While some candidates have attempted to distance themselves from the commander-in-chief as part of a calculated hedge, there is little doubt that – for the president – the campaign trail is his natural home. And it’s an environment he shares with Britain’s Nigel Farage.
Energy Overload
Trump and his UK ally, Farage, are political beasts of a similar order. Like most true extroverts, they get their fuel from other people – specifically, the borrowed energy of a highly motivated crowd. And like many other outgoing personalities, they especially tend to thrive when the pressure is on.
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Farage, who spent last year living high on the hog of near-unanimous polling in his Reform UK party’s favor, found himself in an election doldrum when the surveys began to lean toward newly minted Prime Minister Andy Burnham. So, fresh off the boost of major cash donations, he decided that the campaign trail was the place to be.
And it will, almost certainly, result in a re-energized party frontman. Much the same can be said of President Trump.
The president's approval ratings are at a worrying low. Battered by rising gas prices and a war that just won’t seem to end, Trump appears a warrior without a fight. For sure, the midterms are approaching, but he is not on the ballot. There is no major legislation that he can bully through a Congress that is basically in campaign mode until after the last ballot drops. And idleness is just not in his political DNA.
Cue the rally music.
Trump on the Campaign Trail
High-energy crowds, a vision for the future, and a stack of jibes a mile high are standard fare for a Trump rally. No overproduced tearfests, in which the main draw is the supporting musical act. We can expect to see Trump circa 2024 and 2016.
While candidates in tight races may be glad of the Trump endorsement, it doesn’t quite seem that these congressional hopefuls are the prime motivation. Instead, it seems more likely that Trump wants to pursue his own referendum – on Donald Trump. He is being hit with one bad poll after another, and, legislatively, things are not going his way. This is his version of a fidget spinner.
But will it do any good?
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Well, that’s a two-part question. The first is whether the recipients of a Trump visit will reap a benefit. Notably, he is kicking off this tour in two ruby-red states. He won Oklahoma by more than 30 points each of the three times he was on the ballot. Alabama was a plus-30 in 2024, and more than 25 points in both 2020 and 2016 – these places don’t need a major boost. But maybe he does.
Which brings us to the second part. Will Trump benefit from these rallies? Almost certainly. Kicking off in two hugely Trump-favored locations is like an athlete doing a warm-up. He gets the thrill of being back on stage in front of the fans without risking damage to the candidates. As he perfects his latest routine and gets the script (or lack thereof) down to a tight 90 minutes, the public will get a fresh glimpse of the old Trump. Not the one bogged down by what he likely sees as executive minutiae.
It may or may not help the overall midterm results. And perhaps that’s not even the point. An energized Trump can do a lot of work with just a pen and a phone. And this might be just the elixir he’s looking for. Brace yourself for endless renditions of YMCA and a rebirth of the infamous Trump fist-pump dance.
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