Richard Paul Pasquier
2 min readSep 30, 2019

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Thanks for challenging me to clarify. I had to think about this a bit today. If Trump is removed, it will be because certain Republican Senators make a political judgment that they are better off (their political careers or their party or country) without Trump. But even in the most optimistic scenario, these Republicans will be outnumbered by Republicans who stick with Trump because they like what he represents. Let’s be the most generous and say it has something to do with his border policy, toughness on trade, etc. — the whole America First thing. What do the Republicans do? Do they run a campaign based on Trumpism without Trump? I think they do, or at least try, even if traditional foreign policy hawks who “want to restore our alliances” are back in control to a certain extent. I think the chances of success of a Republican victory are much less than a Republican victory with Trump. So a RNC victory is much less likely, if Trump is removed. I think the chances for removal are low, like 5%, so it is only a conditional probability of let’s say a 80% chance of a Democrat winning if Trump is removed, that only makes the combined probability of a Democratic victory under these conditions a 4% (0.80 x .05) chance, which is close to what I estimated (without doing this math) for the RMB breakout, but which also in this telling must include the probability of a Center-Left coalition winning if Trump is removed. (I have tried to stay away from conditional probabilities in my model, because it quickly gets really complicated). So what remains is the question about whether with Trump’s removal a Center-Left coalition is more likely than with no removal. I think an argument could be made either way, but if Trump is not removed but severely damaged among otherwise Republican elites and some parts of his electoral base, the elite Center (the upper class opinion makers and big economic interests) will feel more free to advocate for a more narrow coalition against Trump (the Left be damned) and roll the dice on a moderate victory. This may either result in a Trump victory or a victory for a vision of mainstream consensus politics that is considerably more elite-friendly than the structural reforms promised by Elizabeth Warren, which I see as being the true measuring stick for whether we are really seeing a Center-Left realignment in American politics.

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Richard Paul Pasquier
Richard Paul Pasquier

Written by Richard Paul Pasquier

Partner at Practus, LLP, a law firm. Rick advises clients on issues at the intersection of business strategy, law and political economy.

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