2016: The Year ‘Never’ Lost Its Meaning

The primaries in 2016 featured a high degree of disdain for the eventual nominees, with both Trump and Hillary having high unfavorables within their own party. But with all of the threats, with all of the fire and brimstone, it appears that right now, the rank and file members of the two main parties are getting in line behind their chosen candidates.

Normally, this would be no surprise. It is the norm for the party’s base to coalesce around a nominee, no matter how heated the nomination process was (See Clinton v. Obama 2008). But very rarely has there ever been such negativity around a candidate that a “Never” movement has built up so much traction. Trump, more so than Hillary, looked like he had a serious uphill battle with his own base. Now, with the convention at hand, it seems that Republicans are so afraid of Hillary that they are willing to swallow their pride and vote for the Donald.

The Real Clear Politics average shows Clinton currently ahead of Trump 43.8 to 41.1 percent, a gap that has closed in recent weeks. Since the start of the Republican National Convention, the same data shows that Trump has gained an even 0.5 points on Clinton and he has not even been featured yet in any major capacity.

As far as voters go, Trump performs well with several key Republican demographics such as older Americans, white Americans, and has incredible support from the Evangelical Community. Most Never Trumpers tend to be college educated, wealthier, females, or minorities isolated by his rhetoric. Regardless of the vocal nature of the now smaller anti-Trump wing of the GOP, the demographics they represent generally poll poorly for Republicans anyway.

All other things being equal, the Republicans needed to make a play for minority and youth votes in 2016, and very few candidates in the course of the primary even made an attempt. Rand Paul was on the only candidate to try to reach out to blacks and millennials with his criminal justice and privacy reform message, but he was often ridiculed and even booed by the base. The voters chose the candidate who told them what they wanted to hear — even if they knew full and well he did not mean what he said. They played the game of identity politics and won.

Prominent elected officials, many who have been critical of Trump, now seem to be singing a different tune. Dick Cheney (who called Trump a liberal Democrat), Rick Perry (who deemed Trump a cancer to conservatism), Paul Ryan (who gave the most lukewarm of endorsements on CNN),  John McCain (who called Trump a threat to his senate seat), Marco Rubio (who called Trump a con-man), and even Rand Paul (who disagrees with Trump on many policy issues) have all now pledged to back the nominee.

Don’t get me wrong; there are some strong anti-Trump forces in elected office (Ben Sasse comes to mind). But with November inching closer, their numbers are shrinking by the day.

Those in conservative media who have taken a strong stand against Trump have been punished in the ratings. Glenn Beck, who bet it all on Ted Cruz, has reportedly lost a lot of money with his news network The Blaze, which has taken a strong anti-Trump editorial stance. The Blaze has seen three CEOs depart in the past two years, including founding CEO Chris Balfe in 2014, and Betsy Morgan and Kraig Kitchin in 2015.

In the end, most of “Never Trump” was not really never Trump. For those advocating such a position within the GOP it was more of a “We really prefer anyone but Trump to be the nominee, but in the end, we’ll take him over Bill’s wife.”

That’s why I scoffed at most of the Never Trumpers. Not because I disagreed with their position, but because I saw it for what it was: disingenuous. While I personally will never vote for Donald J. Trump to be President of the United States, I choose to label myself for what I stand for, rather than what I stand against. Call me a libertarian, because I stand for truly limited government rather than using the term as a talking point to achieve my cultural ends.

So in 2016, you can add “Never” to the list of words that most politicians say but do not really mean.