The GOP establishment would thrive under President Trump

Within moments of seeing Donald Trump’s happy tweets following his meetings with Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell and other congressional leaders, I had an epiphany: A Trump presidency would not bring a political insurrection, it would be a golden age for establishment Republicanism.

For months, conservative pundits have been fixated on Trump’s deviations from conservative orthodoxy while liberal commentators have had a jolly time bringing to light the wackos and white supremacists among his supporters. Everyone in the media has hung on his every insult and hyped a supposed civil war in the Republican Party between the cynical, sold-out Old Guard in Washington and Trump’s angry, fed-up, blue-collar rebels. But now that the smoke has cleared from the primary election battlefield, we find the presumptive GOP presidential nominee easily finding common ground with the Republican speaker of the House and the Senate GOP leader.

And why not? There are acres and acres of common ground. Many of Trump’s national policy positions easily blend with the concerns of the congressional Republicans. Guns? Trump sings the NRA tune. Abortion? Backtracking from his assertion that women who terminate their pregnancies should go to jail hardly makes him a liberal. Taxes? Though he’s meandered a bit on where he stands, his tax plan rewards the rich, and his latest pronouncement on the subject indicates that he wants the wealthy to pay less, not more.

Purist conservatives such as George Will and the folks at National Review do not trust Trump to stay true to right-wing principles, and his crude hucksterism offends their martinis-in-the-drawing-room sensibilities. But it is exactly his total lack of ideological mooring that would make him a great partner for deal-makers like McConnell. Trump has no hidden agenda; he has no real agenda at all. He has made it clear, over and over again, that everything is negotiable, even the two signature positions that Ryan had criticized — a hard line on immigration and a temporary ban on Muslims entering the country. If Trump moves to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, there is every reason to expect alignment with congressional Republicans on most issues.

In a presidential campaign, it is natural to focus on the individuals who seek to be commander in chief, but we do not elect just a president, we elect a presidency — all the people who will be swept into power with the winning candidate. It is not hard to imagine the type of people who would make up Trump’s staff and fill his Cabinet; friends of his from the business world, political operatives such as his campaign guru Paul Manafort and opportunistic politicians like Chris Christie. These will not be insurgents with the welfare of the working class uppermost in their minds. They will be inside players from New York and Washington who have benefited from the status quo with no inclination to change the system in which they have thrived.

Trump may talk in a way that resonates with the guy who works on the docks or down a coal mine, but his friends and associates are rich country club members, celebrities and billionaire businessmen. As president, he would continue to sell the common folk on the idea he is on their side, but his administration would doubtlessly work in concert with the Republican Congress to advance trickle-down economics and build budgets that reward the military and big corporations and go cheap on programs to aid the underclass and the working poor.

The core reason the Republican establishment has opposed Trump is because they fear he will lead the party to a devastating defeat. Now that they are stuck with him, though, they will start contemplating the upside of a Trump victory. By mid-July, when the the GOP conventioneers gather in Cleveland, do not be surprised to see the party establishment deeply invested in their candidate. Sure, he may lose, but, if he wins, that establishment will have as their front man a superb salesman who can make the suckers believe all their old ideas are shiny and new.