JD Vance, the poor boy turned US Marine turned best-selling author turned venture capitalist turned politician, won the Senate Republican Primary in Ohio last night. In his victory speech, Vance, who Donald Trump endorsed, said:
‘They wanted to write a story that this campaign would be the death of Donald Trump’s America First agenda …. It ain’t the death of the America First agenda.’
No it isn’t. But it might also spell the beginning of the end of Donald Trump as the de facto leader of the American Right. Because in JD Vance, and in Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, the increasingly confident ‘America First’ movement has two intelligent leaders who understand the pull of their nation’s political currents in the 2020s. It used to be said that the Republican party had become the party of Trump. But now, perhaps, the party of Trump is becoming Republican again. The Orange Insurgency is ending.
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