However is this sort of enchantment adaptable to a world the place Trump himself can’t legally maintain energy any extra? Some adaptation is possible: The Q realm can likely spin tales the place Trump is secretly the president, or the place he has ascended to the next aircraft of energy, governing as a pantocrator for whom the presidency could be a demotion. And one can think about extra grounded situations through which voting for members of his household is interpreted as a option to let him rule from exile, with a Trump son or daughter taking part in the function that Lurleen Wallace performed for George Wallace when he was term-limited out of the Georgia governor’s mansion and he or she acquired elected in his place.
That form of situation, although, calls for a stage of Machiavellianism that Trump has — at greatest — inconsistently displayed, and a willingness to publicly subordinate himself and construct up others that he has virtually by no means proven. Does Trump really need an inheritor, a successor to whom his legacy belongs? (Ask Mike Pence.) Does he wish to reside in a world the place a son he used to disfavor — to say nothing of somebody who isn’t his flesh and blood — is nominated for president as an alternative of him?
On the very least, we are able to say that the shortcoming to carry energy himself would weaken some of Trump’s enchantment to a few of his supporters, and likewise weaken some of his personal urge for food for the political fray. If he intends to stay a dominant determine within the Republican Celebration, being banned from excessive workplace would require extra adaptation from the soon-to-be ex-president, extra creativity, extra institutional exertion — all harder “asks” for a septuagenarian than simply operating one other major marketing campaign.
And, after all, the ban will definitively make it inconceivable for him to rule the Republican Celebration from contained in the White Home once more, to mix common energy with institutional energy (nonetheless weakly exercised) as he has these final 4 years.
Whereas as a lot as Republicans wish to consider within the “simply fade away” narrative, if Trump will be the nominee in 2024, he actually is likely to be, and even the shadow of that chance will form and warp the G.O.P. effort to go away the occasions of Jan. 6 behind.
What McConnell has earlier than him, then, is a chance to exert company, to wield energy, that’s solely distinctive to early 2021, and might be lengthy passed by 2024. There isn’t a assure that utilizing it is going to work, however at a second when each Republican situation seems unhealthy, it appears extra more likely to depart Trump weakened than simply doing nothing and hoping that some form of losing illness will carry his political efficiency away.