When Events Change Things

If you listen to my show regularly, you will be very familiar with a quote from British Prime Minister Harold MacMillan that perfectly summarizes the events of the past year. When a reporter asked the popular Conservative Prime Minster what was the greatest threat he faced, MacMillan famously replied, “Events dear boy, events.”

A little over a year ago, a cash-flush Ron DeSantis was surging in the GOP primary and Donald Trump was notably behind in the polls. Then Alvin Bragg indicted Trump in New York and Trump began to surge. As other legal threats emerged, Trump skyrocketed in the polls, raked in the money, and laid waste to the Republican primary field.

But as the legal threats began to consume more resources, donors began to turn off the faucets as they realized donations to the Trump campaign were just going to pay his legal bill. Then two months ago, Donald Trump was found guilty in a criminal trial in New York, and large and small donations came pouring in.

Less than a month ago during the President’s historically bad debate performance, Donald Trump ended Biden’s campaign by saying “I don’t know what he said, and I don’t think he did either.” Between then and now, Donald Trump has been shot, a federal judge dismissed his documents case, and Joe Biden withdrew from the race.

A historic election is more than 100 days ahead of us with an unlimited number of unknown events between now and then. For either side to become remotely overconfident would prove that no one has learned anything of the unforeseen events that could still shape this election.