MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” took a look at Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign on Monday, expressing concerns with what Vanity Fair special correspondent Gabriel Sherman describes as the former president being “competent.”
In Sherman’s new piece, titled “Inside the Terrifyingly Competent Trump 2024 Campaign,” he writes about the difference in the way Trump’s campaign is being managed this time around.
“Morning Joe” read a sizable chunk of the story, which states that “while Trump’s 2016 agenda was frequently stymied by infighting and incompetence, available signs point to a second West Wing staffed by loyalists who would actually carry out his policies.”
“Most of all, Trump is disciplined because fear is a powerful motivator. His wealth and freedom are at stake. He is terrified of going to jail,” Sherman writes, adding that “the criminal charges helped solve Trump’s messaging problem.”
After reading the excerpt, cohost Mika Brzezinski noted that Trump “says out loud that he would be a dictator and that he is your retribution to his voters. He says a lot of the quiet part out loud, even the frightening part out loud.”
“He also has a campaign construct that now has his daughter-in-law built in,” Brzezinski continued. “There are a lot of different factors to this that didn’t exist the first time around.”
Sherman agreed, adding that “the big story in 2016, and to some extent 2020, was his campaign was a soap opera. It was clashing personalities and nonstop drama.”
This election cycle, however, feels different to Sherman, who said that he’s been struck by how 2024 is “really a low-drama campaign.”
“Operatives who are focused, don’t want press, don’t want their egos out there,” Sherman continued. “They’re focused on getting Donald Trump to the White House in November 2024 because, as I write in the piece, his freedom is at stake.”
“Really, the only thing that’s guaranteed to keep Donald Trump out of jail is becoming the next President of the United States and appointing an Attorney General who will get these charges thrown out,” Sherman added. “It is really that simple.”
Cohost Joe Scarborough then chimed in, adding that campaign insiders have told him the goal is to “basically minimize him as much as possible, keep his mouth shut, stop him from blowing himself up every day.”
“Every time he opens his mouth, he creates a news cycle,” Sherman agreed. “This is a candidate who does create his own controversies, but, you know, that really is baked in now, I think, to his brand.”
“That is a huge part of making him a more formidable candidate than he has been in the past,” Washington Post national political reported Isaac Arnsdorf added.
