Is it even worth reporting? Well, sorry, here we are.
It’s time to talk about John Bolton’s upcoming 2024 presidential campaign to prevent Donald Trump from reaching the White House again. No, it’s not a joke, but everyone outside of Bolton’s head seems to be laughing at it.
As New York Magazine put it, perhaps with the best headline, “John Bolton Announces 2024’s Most Ridiculous Presidential Bid”. The story broke on Friday of last week and was entirely ignored by everyone with a pulse.
While speaking with Good Morning Britain (seriously), Bolton ended the suspense of no one by announcing his campaign:
Earlier today, John Bolton officially entered the 2024 U.S. presidential race with an announcement to the British media. Bolton, who was George W. Bush’s ambassador to the United Nations during the Iraq War and Donald Trump’s national security adviser until he was fired via Twitter, insisted in his Good Morning Britain interview that this is not a joke or a shameless attempt to sell more books and boost his speaker fees. “I wouldn’t run as a vanity candidate,” he said. “If I didn’t think I could run seriously, then I wouldn’t get in the race.”
Here’s the accompanying clip of Bolton making his case to, um, a British morning television program:
Donald Trump's former national security advisor John Bolton has told us that he will run for US President in a bid to stop his former boss from getting back into the White House. pic.twitter.com/ZY66AFQ2od
— Good Morning Britain (@GMB) January 6, 2023
Perhaps the most obvious criticism of Bolton’s announcement, aside from his 1% polling support, is that he’s speaking to a British audience. These viewers don’t care about his campaign nor can they contribute financially or by voting. In essence, Bolton made his announcement to an audience that has no measurable interest or bearing on his political future.
Beyond that, Bolton says he can beat Donald Trump and plans to run primarily on strengthening foreign policy. Fine, debate foreign policy all day long, it’s a difficult subject.
As to whether Bolton could beat Donald Trump in a head-to-head matchup, there’s no serious reason to even consider this question. Bolton is a man without a base. He lost the establishment crowd by agreeing to work in Trump’s administration and then he lost the MAGA crowd by turning on Trump after he was fired. Many argued at the time that Bolton was not a good fit for Trump’s view on foreign policy which is much more non-interventionist than Bolton would like. The end result, according to reports, was numerous arguments and times when Bolton’s view was the minority view among Trump’s defense advisors and the relationship soured rather quickly.
There is some kind of delusion that takes over individuals infected with TDS. Bolton has it, Liz Cheney has it, and a few others have it. Despite all odds and despite the majority of the Republican Party standing mostly against them, they think they can beat Trump in a primary and win the 2024 GOP nomination. There is no basis for their candidacy and no real argument to make that they can beat Trump since they’re extremely unpopular and have no meaningful connection with a majority of Republican primary voters.
That’s not to say that all Republicans love Trump since many clearly don’t. Are they about to nominate John Bolton as their alternative? Not in a million years.
Put another way, should Ron DeSantis be more concerned about Bolton or Trump in a primary? Should Trump be more concerned about Bolton or DeSantis?
We all know the answer to both questions already.
