When President Trump left office, after an election that saw a lot of postal voting, a system that has been associated with electoral fraud in the UK, some of us expected that Mr Trump would use his considerable support base to start up a new party. This could have been a bad decision as the prospects for third parties is even worse in the USA than it is the UK where the Republican / Democrat domination has lasted even longer than the UK’s Labour/Conservative duopoly.

Now, as time has passed, more information has come out and the rumours that Mr Trump was going to start up a new Patriot Party seem to be just that, rumours. At the conservative political conference CPAC, Mr Trump not only dismissed the idea of a new party as ‘fake news’, he also hinted at a 2024 run.

Whether the claim by Mr Trump is correct that he will run again, is hard to say, but by the time 2024 comes around Mr Trump will be quite elderly and if the America First momentum can continue then that section of the Republican Party, if it continues to dominate the party, may want to nominate a younger candidate to stand a better chance of winning. This concern is likely to become more apparent especially if Joe Biden the current president, messes up or is perceived to mess up and his mistakes are linked to his age, then there may be pressure on the Republicans to nominate a younger candidate.

Donald Trump in my view was mostly good for America. He was good on the economy and very good on foreign affairs as he managed to do what so many other US Presidents have failed to do and that is negotiate better relations in the Middle East. He was good for the confidence of Americans and had no qualms about standing up to challengers such as China. Did he make some errors? Yes of course he did. His throwaway comment about developing a vaccine for Covid as ‘Operation Warp Speed’ helped to feed the anti vaccination crazies who to this day refuse to believe the truth that mRNA vaccination techniques were developed over decades and instead believe that they were developed on too much haste and are therefore ‘dangerous’.

Although Mr Trump still has an incredible level of in party support it’s not assured that he will end up as the Republican’s candidate for President in 2024. This is a party with a number of factions some of whom are happy with the America First agenda and some who are not. Whether the America Firsters can continue to control the party or whether they will go the way of the Christian Evangelist faction and become less relevant to the party only time will tell. It’s never good for a party that needs to get support from all sections of a population to cleave too closely to a party’s bedrock and sometimes more extreme supporters. This is a lesson that the Labour Party in Britain learned with Jeremy Corbyn. Corbyn was popular with party members but a complete turn off for the general public.

Whilst some of the current sitting representatives and senators both at state and federal level who are seen as weak and vacillating and part of ‘the swamp’ will face primary challenges prior to the 2022 mid terms, it is unsure at this stage whether these challenges by the America First faction will be successful. If these challenges are successful and America First candidates are put up for election then these candidates will have to compromise to a certain extent. This is because by being completely uncompromising they may not be able to carry with them moderate Republicans or bring over those Democrat supporters of moderate views who the Republicans need to court in order to win a Presidential Election.

I’d like to see a Trump II administration not just because he mostly did good things for America but also because he was not hostile to the United Kingdom and to British aspirations. However I’m realistic enough to know that there is much that could happen between now and 2024 that could preclude a new Trump administration, not only but including concerns about Trump’s age at election time. It would be good if those who are not Mr Trump in the Republican Party who could push forward a more America-centric policy platform and started to work towards nomination now or build their base now, just in case Mr Trump cannot stand again for some reason or the American public turns against the idea of another very elderly President. The Republicans need to be very careful that they don’t put all their eggs into the Trump basket and leave themselves without a credible alternative to Mr Trump when the time comes for Presidential election nominations.