Almost from the moment that Donald J. Trump announced his candidacy there has been a general consensus on what he would do if (or when) he lost and left the race for the White House. Even after he secured the Republican nomination and began to get uncomfortably close to the highest office in the land there was still a pretty good sense for what would happen afterwards: Trump would lose the election, spend a little while complaining on social media and on FOX News, but before too long he would transition back into being everyone’s least favorite real estate mogul, fading from the political landscape.
That confidence that Trump would disappear from politics after November has slowly been eroded over the past few weeks, replaced with a growing consensus that Trump is far from done with politics, and that the ramifications of his candidacy may remain with us for years to come.
The first sign that Trump would not return to being a simple businessman came in the form of his brand name itself. The Trump name has become toxic over the past year. Early in the campaign, after Trump made his now notorious comments about Mexican immigrants being murderers and rapists, two renown celebrity chefs backed out of a deal to open a high end restaurant in one of his hotels.
Foot traffic to his hotels in 2016 appears to be down anywhere between 14% and 27%, according to Foursquare. Bookings at his hotels fell by almost 60% during the first half of 2016. Trump’s personal brand has taken a serious hit, and more people than ever are turned off by the giant “Trump” name on the side of his buildings. This has only gotten worse as the election has gone on, with protests and anti-Trump rallies taking place at many of his properties.
Secondly Trump himself has begun to adopt a drastically different rhetoric, one that foreshadows how he will handle the aftermath of the election. He has begun to suggest that he would refuse to accept the outcome of the election if he loses, claiming that the election is “rigged.” He has blamed everyone from the media to the Republican establishment to Clinton backers of conspiring to “steal” the election from him. If he actually carried out his threat to refuse to concede the election it would be unprecedented in American political history. Some of his backers would certainly stand by him, refusing to accept the legitimacy of a Clinton Presidency, rallying behind Trump to create a level of paranoia and toxicity rarely before seen in politics.
So what happens next? It seems like Trump is on track to develop his newfound political fame and rabid following among the alt-right into a new political network, beginning with “Trump TV.” Apparently he wants to start a radically right wing media outlet, similar FOX News with a touch of Breitbart and Drudge mixed in.
This is highlighted by the fact that Trump’s campaign CEO is Steve Bannon, the former chairman of Breitbart News, a radical alt-right media source specializing in clickbait headlines, inflammatory articles, and ideological extremism. Sound familiar?
Rumors of this plan started as far back as June, when Vanity Fair ran an article claiming that Trump had discussed this idea with his daughter Ivanka and his media consultants. One source in the Vanity Fair article claimed that “win or lose, we are onto something here. We’ve triggered a base of the population that hasn’t had a voice in a long time.” And now that Trump appears to have all but assured his own defeat the likelihood of such an outcome seems higher than ever.
Beyond that Trump’s rallies and fundraising among the radical right is unlikely to stop anytime soon. Unlike a traditional politician who has an incentive to save face after an electoral defeat Trump has no such motivations. He can continue traversing the country spewing his message of intolerance, hatred, and anti-intellectualism to a crowd of angry and resentful supporters who believe that Trump lost a “rigged election” and that he deserved to be President.
Supporters of Donald Trump are not going anywhere. No, not the cowardly Republicans who have only backed Trump out of fear, but the true believers, the men and women who pack Trump’s rallies and start chants of “lock her up” when Hillary’s name comes up. Defeating Donald Trump is only the beginning. His supporters, his message, and his ideology are here to stay.
Keep that in mind after Election Day. Even if Trump loses we will be dealing with the ramifications of his candidacy for years to come.
