'Biggest Loser': Conservative WSJ editorial board struggles to pick viable Trump alternative

04 September 2023

From August 24-30, the Rupert Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal conducted a poll that showed former President Donald Trump leading second-place candidate Ron DeSantis by 46 percent among 2024 GOP presidential primary voters. But what the Journal reports and what its conservative editorial board would like to see happen are two different things.

The board, which has often been critical of Trump but without going full-fledged Never Trumper, is hoping that a major alternative to the former president will emerge in the primary. But Trump remains the frontrunner, and only a few rival candidates — namely, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and former Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas) — have been outright scathing in their criticism of him.

In an article published on September 4, The New Republic's Walter Shapiro describes the WSJ editorial board members' struggle to find an alternative to Trump who really excites them.

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"Always uncomfortable with Donald Trump's America First populism and bombast, the Journal's three-page print editorial section turned on the defrocked president with a fury the day after the 2022 midterm elections," Shapiro observes. "Not only did the Journal headline its lead editorial 'Trump Is The Republican Party's Biggest Loser,' but it also ran three other op-eds belittling the sneering face of the GOP."

The journalist continues, "Since then, the edit page has not softened its view of Trump personally, although each indictment has been dismissed as prosecutorial overreach by forces aligned with Joe Biden…. But if not Trump for president, then who?"

Shapiro notes that the WSJ's Republican presidential check list includes "hawkish, anti-populist and, perhaps above all, viable."

"As the most prominent print voice of Reagan-era conservatism," Shapiro argues, "the Journal is not about to lavish column inches on no-hope candidates like Asa Hutchinson. In DeSantis, the editorialists thought they had found their man: someone who would sucker the Trump enthusiasts, but who, deep down, was really just like them. But so far, DeSantis has bamboozled no one."

Shapiro adds, "Chris Christie, in particular, presents the Journal with a dilemma. His vitriol-dipped contempt for Trump undoubtedly appeals to Murdoch…. But Christie, despite his potential appeal to independents who can vote in the New Hampshire primary, does not have a plausible route to the nomination."

The New Republic's full article can be found at this link.

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