Running for President in 2024? CPAC 2022 Straw Poll’s Top Two Contenders

                                         

AWAKE, NOT WOKE.  Sounding this defiant and clarion meme, the American Conservative Union once again, for a second time, hosted its annual gathering in Orlando, Florida, this year at the Rosen Shingle Creek resort hotel from February 24 -27, 2022.   The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) is the largest yearly conclave of proudly patriotic Americans who are unabashedly conservative, adoring of America as originally conceived and traditionally understood, and not at all chary of proclaiming its foundational exceptionalism.  In the face of the most radical-left regime ever to rule this nation, conservatives and libertarians have needed a collective, metaphorical “shot in the arm” (no thanks to “Dr.” Anthony Fauci) to inspire sustained, principled civil resistance and counterforce to the onslaught of absurd, delusional, and destructive policies emanating from the White House and Congress since January 20, 2021.   This they got in spades at CPAC 2022.  The parade of luminaries with great things to say was stellar and galvanizing, providing a robust springboard for the coming midterm electoral battles later this year.   Clarity of purpose, perspective, and position was palpable in every speaker’s remarks, whether a current officeholder, candidate for elective office, pundit, or policy wonk.   CPAC always delivers the core conservative message, of course, but this year it did so especially well.

The impetus now for conservatives to gather, get inspired, get energized, get organized, and get working to elect conservatives at every level has never been greater, being loudly demanded by the increasingly disorienting times we live in.  After only one year of total control of the federal government by hard-Left Democrats, the regime of Joe Biden threatens to erode, cleave, and subvert Americans’ liberty, prosperity, security, moral cohesion, and sovereignty.  All conservatives and other sane, sensible citizens must rally in the face of the rolling insurrection against this constitutional republic that began in earnest on Inauguration Day 2021.  Presto!, this CPAC provided the counterrevolt with a loud and splashy launch.         

The speaker line-up was particularly compelling, with a multitude of celebrity pundits, commentators, wonks, and strong conservative candidates for elective office across the nation.  But early on, one of the most convicted advocates at this or any other year’s CPAC confab was the current governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, already a conservative icon in his first term for his many principled actions in signing legislative bills and issuing executive orders that honor and will surely work to guarantee Floridians’ safety, security, election integrity, public morality, and educational sanity.  In a 20-minute stemwinder, DeSantis cited his aggressive countermoves against “Faucian dystopia” (disavowing the federal vaccine mandates and passports), electoral subversion (outlawing ballot harvesting and the privatizing of election management), Big Tech elitist censorship (penalizing it criminally), public street chaos (criminalizing political rioting), transgender ideology (protecting women’s athletics), radical demographical transformation (banning sanctuary cities and removing illegal migrants to Delaware), and usurpation of parents’ child-raising authority (banning the teaching of Critical Race Theory and child sexualization in K-12 schools).  In addition to emulating President Trump’s appointment of three jurists to the highest court in his state, DeSantis has halted the onslaught of “progressive” efforts to rob Americans of their rights, freedoms, jobs, businesses, and sovereignty.  In less than four years, he has set a template for a 10^th Amendment defense of Americanism that all states should act to follow.   At CPAC, he was rewarded for his raw combination of smarts, courage, creativity, and steadfastness:  In a straw poll conducted among the attendees for their preferred nominee for president in 2024, he outpolled all other new possible contenders combined, besting everyone except Donald Trump.   With Trump eliminated as a choice in a second round, DeSantis cleared the table even more dramatically.   America has a bold new champion in the event Trump decides not to run again in 2024.   

Another striking highlight was a speech by journalist/author Julie Kelly, who chronicled the partisan authoritarian abuses and derelictions of the Biden regime since the sensationalized riot at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.  From the mass arrests and incarceration of peaceful patriotic attendees at that event without due process, bail, legal representation, speedy trials, and humane treatment to the abject failure to hold criminally accountable any of the rioters, looters, arsonists, and killers who tormented so many American cities in the summer and fall of 2020, Kelly painted an Orwellian picture of an administration selectively sanctioning political violence, censoring opposing views, resisting legitimate inquiries, suppressing video evidence, misusing law enforcement, and eroding and ignoring many sacred legal norms and constitutional protections.   She exhorted the audience to recognize how very critical to the future of American Liberty the upcoming elections this year are:  Failure at the polls is not an option if our free republic is to survive.

The critical issue of energy supply for the nation was spotlighted by Governor Kristi Noem (R-SD), an ardent advocate for American energy production and independence.   Cataloging the stream of injurious restrictions, permit withholdings, and project abrogations of the O’Bidenistas, she reminded attendees just how essential to prosperity a free and thriving domestic energy-production market is.  Along with Governor DeSantis, Noem acted throughout the Covid scare of 2020-21 to maintain her citizens’ freedoms to conduct business, attend their jobs and schools, worship, and avert all mandates and lockdowns.   Her clear-mindedness, staunch pragmatism, and firm reliance on traditional American precepts of governance will likely make her a serious contender for higher office in the coming years.     

In one of his now-trademark 90-minute orations, President Trump delivered a rousing review of his manifold successes as president, warned of the plethora of threats Americans face under the Biden regime and Pelosi/Schumer Congress, catalogued the many electoral depredations orchestrated by radical Democrats and Big Tech that criminally deprived him of a second term in 2020, and urged his supporters to work for the resumption of the policies and acts that were making America a truly great nation again.  Advocating for renewed energy independence, a completed border wall, strict migration controls, a pantheon of election reforms, new presidential termination authority over federal bureaucrats, a revitalized pro-America military, a strong and resolute America First foreign policy, full prosecution of violent criminals, an end to Covid-inspired mandates, the empowerment of parents to veto radical gender ideology in schools, and the legal breakup of Big Tech’s oligarchy, Trump had the audience repeatedly standing and applauding with giddy and gleeful approval.  Rising in tempo and high passion, he responded to the aims of what he characterized as “the radical, power-hungry ruling class” to extinguish “our identity as Americans and rob us of our liberties” with this Churchillian peroration:  “The People of America will not surrender our borders, our culture, our faith, our values, our history, our liberty, or our children to a small band of bullies and extremists who want to tell everyone else what to do.”   It was, once again among many, a vocal tour de force , one that signals to this observer that Donald Trump will be running for president again in 2024.   Coyness be damned.          

The charge to CPAC’s attendees this year was annunciated loud and ringingly clear by many speakers throughout the conference.   In perhaps the most succinct, stirring call to action to American patriots in 2022, North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, to tumultuous applause, exhorted the assembled throng to: “Stand Up, Lean Forward, and Fight Back!”  If such brio fully materializes throughout the nation in the coming months, 2022 may well be a singularly pivotal year in American history.   May this so “woke tyranny” be gone!