The United States has become an angry country, at least on the right, if we stick to the preferences of Republican voters for the 2024 presidential primaries. In the polls, the degree of support for the different party candidates it is directly proportional to the political aggressiveness and catastrophizing of each of them: the greater the fury, the greater the support.
Former President Donald Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, each more incendiary and dark in his vision of the country, are the only ones to obtain double-digit percentages (more than 50% and 20%, respectively). Both are far ahead of the rest of the applicants; in particular to those who project more optimistic messages, with the former ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley and the black senator Tim Scott as the main bearers of hope for the future of the nation.
"Everything about Scott's personality and approach goes against what is dominant in the Republican Party today," says political consultant Liz Mair, formerly a strategist for conservative politicians and head of Online Communications for the National Committee, in The New York Times. Republican in 2008. “He's a very positive, upbeat guy, and you don't see that much today in either party. Scott is also smart and a powerful communicator." But...
But Scott, praised by the media on both sides as a "good guy," kind and likable from his strongly conservative speech; senator from South Carolina proud of his humble family origins, of his grandfather who had to drop out of school to work picking cotton and of a single mother who brought him up; Scott, 57, who everyone seems to like and who has been given $22 million by Wall Street businessmen and Republican donors to finance his candidacy, is stuck between a 1% and 2% vote projection.
“America is great; the country of opportunities! My family's history proves it: from cotton to Congress!” he yells. But nothing. He doesn't move.
The same thing happens to Nikki Haley. At 51 years old, with a resume of bells after representing the country at the United Nations in 2017 and 2018 and serving as governor of South Carolina for the previous six years, the former diplomat barely exceeds 4% with her message of confidence in the future. . And the presentation of her as the "proud daughter of Indian immigrants" doesn't seem to work either.
“Haley should be an interesting candidate: the daughter of immigrants, the former governor of a state with large population changes, a UN ambassador … but she lacks a real basis to run for office: she is not a populist and she is not a warrior either. culture," says analyst Jane Coaston, who specializes in American conservatives.
The commander in chief of the culture wars that Coaston alludes to is undoubtedly DeSantis, who last night chose a “Twitter space” with the new owner of the network, the tycoon Elon Musk, to officially announce his candidacy. A postulation preceded by an impressive legislative deployment against transgender people and sex change, abortion, education on gender and racism, the employment of immigrants without papers... You have to pursue –he comes to defend– a lot of progressive causes or of the woke agenda inherited from the “wake up” movement against racism and inequality in the 1930s.
DeSantis does seem capable of putting up a fight with Trump, especially if he were ultimately weakened by the court cases against him. But at the moment this is not the case, and the former president prevails in all vote estimates. “We're going to World War III if we don't do something fast! The dollar is collapsing! Immigrants invade us! Biden is a traitor and the Democrats are left-wing fascists!”, the ultra leader repeats at each rally. And all that does seem to sell in the Republican parish. Does it matter much that the advocate is a sex offender accused of bribery and being investigated for trying to rig the election he lost, among other things? For now not much. On the American right, and to this day, crime does not penalize. And anger is on the rise.
