Democratic strategist James Carville said Wednesday that the only way the members of the GOP can get their party back is “through a blowout” of former President Trump in November.
MSNBC’s Ari Melber asked Carville what he thought about a report from Politico that suggested some Republicans would be “OK” with the former president losing if it meant they could rebuild their party. Carville suggested that only Vice President Harris winning by a large margin could help the Republican Party move on from Trump.
“And remember, Republicans got blown out in ’64 and won the presidency in ’68. Democrats got blown out in ’72 and won the presidency in ’76. So, what I tell my Republican friends, if you want your party back, if you want the kind of pro-business, lower taxes, lighter regulatory cuts, you know, stand erect at attention during the anthem — the only way you’re gonna get that back is through a blowout,” Carville said on MSNBC’s “The Beat.”
“If Harris gets 280 electoral votes, it’s not going to change. And I think there’s a growing recognition of that — not just from kind of elite, Washington, never-Trumpers, but there seems to be a sense of that on the ground also,” Carville added.
Carville wrote a guest essay for The New York Times earlier this week outlining a three-pronged strategy for Harris to boost her chances of winning in November. Carville, who served as a senior adviser to former President Clinton’s campaign, said Harris’s “greatest political advantage” is that the public opinion on Trump is “settled.”
He echoed similar sentiments Wednesday, saying Harris has much more work to do than Trump to introduce herself to the American people during next week’s debate. ABC News will host the first debate between Harris and Trump on Sept. 10.
“Sometimes we overhype debates; we overhype the importance of debates. I think in this one, it might be a little bit worth the hype here, you know. We’ll see how it turns out,” he said. “But, he kind of needs this, and she needs it too, because she needs a platform to really introduce herself to the voters of America. People now know about her but don’t quite know her yet.”
The debate comes as many polls show a close race between Harris and Trump. The Hill/Decision Desk HQ’s national polling average shows Harris leading the former president by 4 percentage points, based on an aggregate of 155 polls.
The Hill has reached out to the Trump campaign for comment.