Donald Trump leads by a mile….
BUT?
IF he should somehow NOT make it thru in one piece?
The subs on the bench seem to be a hurt-in Ron DeSantis and a surprisingly rising Nikki Haley….
IT’S A ONE-CANDIDATE RACE — WITH TWO BACKUPS. Some Republicans have long wanted the GOP presidential field to narrow. They hoped the also-ran candidates would drop out. So far, there hasn’t been much of that. Instead, the field has effectively narrowed itself.
The bottom tier is out of it. Asa Hutchinson, Doug Burgum, Tim Scott, Chris Christie, and Vivek Ramaswamy — none of them ever touched 10% support nationally, and now they’re all under 5%, some even lower. Former Vice President Mike Pence, who dropped out over the weekend, was in that group, too.
That leaves just three candidates: Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis, and Nikki Haley….
…
…..what if one or more of those lawsuits and prosecutions succeed? What if, for example, Democrats manage to take Trump off the ballot in some, or all, states? To convict him of some number of felonies? Who knows what will happen — one possibility is prolonged chaos — but the Republican Party will need a presidential candidate. That’s where the two backups, DeSantis and Haley, might come in….