(CNN)On Friday morning, former Trump White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney was asked by CNN's John Berman whether he wanted Donald Trump to run for president again in 2024.
"There's a lot of folks that Republicans can vote for that get the same policies and the same sort of willingness to stand up and fight for the middle class that Donald Trump had without the baggage.
"I think you get a lot of the benefits without a lot of the drawbacks. ... I think that's where a lot of Republicans are as a direct result of these [January 6] hearings."
The argument Mulvaney is effectively making is if Republicans can get someone -- like, say, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis -- who is 90% of Trump (since no one is 100% Trump other than Trump), they should jump at that chance.
Because, well, 100% Trump comes with all sorts of built-in negatives -- most notably that he lost a bid for a second term less than two years ago and has spent the time between then and now pursuing demonstrably false claims that the election was stolen from him.
Mulvaney's logic is, in short, right. Trumpism -- over-the-top nationalism, a rejection of "woke" culture etc. -- is more popular within the Republican Party than is Trump himself. So, in theory, if you decouple Trumpism from Trump, you may well have a winner.
A New York Times/Siena College poll released earlier this week suggests that there is at least some bloc of support for Mulvaney's view. Nearly half of those who said they planned to vote in the 2024...
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