Live from Music Row Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – official guest host Grant Henry welcomed all-star panelist Clint Brewer in-studio to discuss Trump endorsements and the national political landscape in response to a new Republican standard.
Henry: We are joined in-studio right now by the all-star panelist, Clint Brewer. How are you doing, sir?
Brewer: I’m good! I’m better now knowing that Cinco de Mayo is a celebration of defeating the French. I wasn’t aware of that. (Henry laughs) It gives new meaning to me. Any holiday built around defeating the French is to be celebrated in America for sure.
Henry: Now you have something to cheer for later on.
Brewer: Absolutely. That margarita is going to taste better.
Henry: Raise a glass to the defeat of the French. That’s right. You also said, too, that you’re a little bit down about the Preds not performing so well.
Brewer: Yeah. I mean, 7 to 2, it’s kind of bad. It’s not a terribly competitive hockey game.
Henry: That’s right. You know who was terribly competitive, some of these Trump folks in Ohio and Indiana last night. Let’s talk about this in the next couple of segments here. Let me read this here, Clint, and I’ll get your take on some of this stuff. This is the MBR headline:
“Trump’s endorsement power was evident in Ohio and Indiana, they say, but there are limits.” I don’t think there are, but we’ll get to that here in a second.
They say former President Donald Trump’s endorsement catapulted J.D. Vance to victory in last night’s Republican primary in Ohio’s open Senate race, taking him from the middle of the pack in polling to first place.
Republican candidates backed by former President Trump had a good night in Ohio and Indiana on Tuesday night. Many of the candidates are younger and likely to make it to Congress.
And if more of them win elsewhere this year, this cycle could repeat or could represent something of a bridge to Trumpism, even post-Trump. There are examples of these potentially lasting effects all throughout the GOP. And this is what I kind of want to ask you.
First, your take on these Trump endorsements. I think there are 33 he’s either made so far or will come through. What’s your take on the Trump endorsement in general? Does it still have staying power? What are you looking at?
Brewer: The greatest rule of politics is to be in favor of what’s going to happen. And so I think what you are seeing, it’s a chicken and the egg issue.
Is it former President Trump’s endorsement or is it the current political condition? Because a lot of what’s going on in this country right now mirrors the condition that allowed him to rise up through the ranks in his own primary for the 2016 election.
You’ve got an economy that’s less than stellar. You’ve got disillusionment in America, with America, by Americans who very much want America to be great.
There’s a lot of angst right now. There’s a lot of disappointment, particularly in rural areas, sort of the jobless rebound. The jobless economy growth is real.
Henry: In the way you described it, the analogy used – the chicken and the egg analogy. That’s exactly what it is.
Brewer: Right.
Henry: Circumstances alone will put some qualified, competent Republican candidates out there, even in spite of or a lack of the Trump endorsement. Now, that’s not to say the Trump endorsement doesn’t help, but it’s interesting.
Sometimes I want to say that as leftist-leaning media pitches me as a Republican voter, it’s the primary thing they’re considering. It’s like if that Trump endorsement is not there, I’m not voting. I don’t think that’s the case.
Brewer: It’s not the case at all. And I think it’s just an oversimplification of the priorities and nuances of politics on the right that many reporters don’t understand.
It’s not necessarily following the man, it’s following the circumstances. And it’s the same set of circumstances that he latched onto and caught fire with before. So again, is it the man or is it the national landscape?
And I think if you look at the national landscape, it’s going to give rise to … people who very much want to put America first are a little isolationist, perhaps.
If you look at J.D. Vance’s stance on Ukraine, it’s just wildly out of step with the rest of the elected Republicans in Congress. But it may not be wildly out of step with a lot of people in rural America. It’s very complicated. But the press doesn’t always like it complicated.
Henry: (Chuckles) That’s right. They don’t like nuance. It’s too hard to explain in 200 characters, right? Like they really don’t want it to be black and white.
Brewer: And I’ll say this: That’s true for their analysis, unfortunately, on politics on both the Left and the Right. There’s a lot of nuance to what goes on in the Left that they just miss because it’s not easy to tell. You can’t tweet about it. You can’t get it in a 90-second news segment. It’s hard to do.
Henry: Yeah, I will say one thing I think they do have correct here is that Trump has set a new standard. He changed the paradigm, okay? He set a new standard for what the party could become. This party being awake, not woke. And for Republicans to redefine Republicanism in the next midterms coming up.
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Donald Trump” by Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0.
