OPINION:
Most election postmortems highlight the issues that played badly for Vice President Kamala Harris and were advantageous to President-elect Donald Trump: inflation, chaos on the world stage and uncontrolled immigration.
The Harris-Walz campaign failed to put any daylight between Ms. Harris and the unpopular policies of President Biden, while the Trump-Vance campaign made voters yearn for the booming economy, control of illegal immigration and relative peace abroad during Mr. Trump’s first term.
But there was another element to Mr. Trump’s historic success, which history will record as the greatest political comeback of all time: the discipline of messaging and the absence of distracting and destructive political infighting. While the anti-Trump media highlighted the internecine wars that persisted in Mr. Trump’s previous two presidential campaigns and through his term, they had little material to work with regarding his coherent and well-run 2024 effort.
We can expect this cessation of factional infighting to last into the new Trump term with his choice of campaign co-manager Susie Wiles as White House chief of staff. Much of the unified messaging, professionalism and streamlined operations that characterized Mr. Trump’s 2024 campaign can be attributed to her quiet, persistent leadership and expert navigation of exigencies.
Road bumps and potential hazards such as Mr. Biden’s withdrawal from the race and the candidacy of independent Robert F. Kennedy Jr. were masterfully handled to maximum political benefit. Without his subsequent endorsement and delivery of his enthusiastic following, Mr. Kennedy’s withdrawal could have been a major setback to the Trump effort, as his voters would likely have stayed home. The incorporation of Mr. Kennedy and his Make America Healthy Again issues into the MAGA coalition was a masterstroke, and Ms. Wiles played a vital part in making that possible.
Another brilliant move was to shift from an exclusive focus on negative coverage from the mainstream media (while VP candidate J.D. Vance’s combative and virtuoso network appearances highlighted how out of touch the media talking heads are with public opinion) toward alternative media. On the advice of Mr. Trump’s sons and Ms. Wiles, Mr. Trump and Mr. Vance both took massive advantage of the huge podcast followings and long-form interview formats of alternative media personalities Joe Rogan and Tucker Carlson. This key strategy shift was essential to the massive win.
To wind down the forever wars, get the economy back on track and put an end to the Biden-orchestrated illegal entry of unvetted migrants at our southern border, Mr. Trump cannot afford any internal forces not on board the MAGA train or covertly working to undermine his agenda, as we saw in the first term. As chief of staff, Ms. Wiles will ensure that Mr. Trump’s policies and wishes are carried out without hesitation or bureaucratic slow-rolling, just as she managed the successful campaign.
The strategic coup the campaign accomplished by going over the heads of the old information gatekeepers in the mainstream media should be after Mr. Trump takes office. The dying and humiliated opposition mainstream media should be relegated to a back seat or entirely excluded from press briefings in a new administration, and the alternative media should be given a position justified by their newly won influence.
With the first GOP presidential popular vote majority in 20 years (and a humiliated opposition mainstream media), Mr. Trump has a mandate for leadership that he did not enjoy the first time around. He also has a golden opportunity to implement his agenda and build on the new MAGA political coalition that he has forged. Ms. Wiles will be a key asset in seeing that this is accomplished.
• Rob Wasinger was director of Senate relations for the Trump transition team in 2016 and the first White House liaison at the State Department during the Trump administration.
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