Republicans hesitate to put hand up for 2024

Donald Trump’s star might be fading but only former UN envoy Nikki Haley has put up her hand to take him on in the 2024 presidential race.

Nikki Haley is the only Replican apart from Donald Trump who has declared she will run for 2024. Picture: Getty Images.

Donald Trump’s star might be fading but few Republicans have put up their hand to take on the former president in his third bid for the White House.

The former president still has the money, the name, and the sheer chutzpah to terrify potential contenders.

This time four years ago nine Democrats, including Kamala Harris and Pete Buttigieg, had already declared their hand, putting themselves at the vanguard of a growing throng of hopefuls eager to make Mr Trump a one term president.

Fast forward to now, and only one Republican apart from the former president himself, former state governor and Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, has had the courage to announce her candidacy for president in 2024, scheduled for 15th February in her home state of South Carolina.

Why the hesitation? It’s certainly not Joe Biden they fear, whose declining abilities and limp popularity should make him a popular opponent.

Mr Trump, still the 800-pound gorilla of GOP politics, himself gave the clearest explanation in an interview on Thursday (Friday AEDT), suggesting he might not back the GOP’s pick for president if it turns out to be someone else.

“It would depend,” Mr Trump said when asked on radio if he would support the winning candidate.

“It would have to depend on who the nominee was,” he added, words that served as a reminder competitors could face the wrath of the former president before and after the ultimate Republican primary showdown around the middle of 2024.

Nikki Haley was a major supporter of Donald Trump during his presidency. Picture: AFP

Mr Trump, whose personal brand commands intense support among a minority of Republicans, would destroy any hope the GOP might have of retaking the White House in 2025 if he ran as an independent, serving up a repeat of 1992, when Ross Perot helped Bill Clinton cruised to victory, mopping up 19 per cent of the vote.

By the end of February 2019, Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar, two high profile senators, had thrown their hat into the ring for a race Joe Biden, who announced in April 2019, ultimately won.

Unless they are planning a surprise, none of the Republicans bandied about as possible challengers has yet flagged a plan to run, including Florida’s governor Ron DeSantis, who won his re-election in November in a landslide, former secretary of state Mike Pompeo and former vice president Mike Pence.

Not a peep yet from high-profile Republican senators Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio, both of whom may be loath to end up in Mr Trump’s rhetorical crosshairs, which have already taken aim at Mr DeSantis in a series of social media posts.

Betting markets still put DeSantis, who has studiously avoided being drawn into speculation about 2024, ahead of Trump to win the GOP nomination, on around 37 per cent chance each, followed by Nikki Haley on 10 per cent, and the two Mikes on 4 per cent each.

Mr Trump has raised less than US$10 million for his 2024 campaign since his formal announcement in November, well down on efforts by previous leading candidates for president, including Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton, in the first few weeks of their campaign.

But Trump Inc has raised more than $500 million since the end of 2020, in a vast network of political action committees, according to Open Secrets, which tracks campaign contributions, dwarfing Mr DeSantis’s $90 million left over from his state campaigns.

The Republican governor of New Hampshire, Chris Sununu, interviewed by CNN on Thursday, applauded Ms Hayley’s candidacy but remained on the fence about his own rumoured bid.

“Everyone knows a crowded field could be problematic … but there is a long way to go and a lot of politics to be played out,” he added said, reflecting fears among some strategists that the more Republican contenders in the ‘non-Trump’ lane, the more likely the former president will win the nomination.

It’s early days still, given primary election for each of the two parties, don’t begin for another 12 months.

Meanwhile Joe Biden, 80, is punters’ current favourite to win the overall contest.

For all the humiliation of recent revelations that he kept classified documents at his former office and private home, it’s unlikely to dissuade him from running again.

After next week’s state of the union address on 7th February, he will come under intense scrutiny to reveal his own intentions.

If for some reason he becomes the first president since Lyndon Johnson not to seek a second term, the Democrat race could end up far more colourful and crowded than the slim Republican field.