We forget this sometimes, but Donald Trump lost the overall popular vote, and ultimately prevailed only by winning several Rust Belt states by a very small margin. A normal politician would respond to that by focusing his message on swing voters. Trump is anything but normal, however; his sole interest is in base mobilization, partly because he thinks it works, but partly because it’s fun.
Last night unsurprisingly proved that base mobilization alone will not produce victories consistently on a national level. No matter how the GOP spins the facts, the bottom line is that they did poorly in the Rust Belt states that are almost certainly going to decide the 2020 election, and the loss of the House means their legislative agenda is effectively dead.
So how will Trump respond to the new state of affairs? His options are to: (a) change his ways and try to govern on a bipartisan basis, probably starting with a new emphasis on a real infrastructure bill; (b) maintain the status quo and hope for a different result; or (c) double down and try to change the facts, which could well include a war, government shutdowns, constitutional crises, and additional efforts at voter suppression and violations of civil rights.
I think you can go ahead right now and write off (a). The other two are realistic possibilities. The one I really worry about, obviously, is (c). If I were a betting man, that’s the one I would pick.