I’m not convinced that Trump has done better against the Democrats than an ordinary pre-MAGA Republican candidate would have. It’s normal for the party in power to switch every eight years, and in that context the unusual thing about Trump is not that he won in 2016 but that he lost in 2020. Biden/Harris’s loss in 2024 is also unusual but so is running a senile candidate, forcing him to step aside far too late, and then replacing him with his vice president who has no significant accomplishments and no way to distance herself from his unpopular policies.

There is something important that Democrats need to change about their strategy, but that’s running candidates based on their appeal to the public rather than on their seniority within the party. I had hoped that they learned that lesson after Hillary Clinton’s failure but they didn’t. I think they will do well if they run a young, charismatic centrist like Bill Clinton or Obama in 2028.