⁍ Zelizer: A landside election is one of the few cataclysmic events that could challenge our current political landscape.
⁍ If Democrats mount a significant victory, Republicans could face the potential loss of both the White House and the Senate majority, as well as stinging defeats at the state and local level.
⁍ Zelizer: A huge defeat could give younger voices in the GOP —rather than the Tucker Carlson types who take a deeper dive into Trumpian Republicanism.

– President Trump’s fellow Republicans should be “terrified” by the prospect of a massive loss in the 2020 election, Princeton history professor Julian Zelizer writes at CNN. “We haven’t seen a landslide victory since Republican Ronald Reagan defeated Democrat Walter Mondale in the 1984 presidential election,” Zelizer writes. “That was an important victory because it cemented the political standing of the conservative movement that Reagan brought into the halls of power and solidified the coalition of neo-conservatives, the religious right and business and Wall Street conservatives that Reagan had stitched together in his 1980 election.” A loss of both the White House and the Senate majority, as well as stinging defeats at the state and local level, would be particularly devastating for the GOP, given the fact that the Republican base has been shrinking for some time. “A landside election is one of the few cataclysmic events that could actually challenge our current political landscape,” Zelizer writes. “It would leave Republicans, a party influenced by intense partisanship, to finally do some serious soul-searching and put forth constructive policies and a new political strategy in order to win again. It would force a reckoning within the party, which has stood loyally by President Trump throughout his term.”

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/18/opinions/trump-reelection-poll-numbers-republican-party-reckoning-zelizer/index.html