A mere hours after Trump’s late-night victory speech in November 2016, after I finished my initial celebrations, I immediately turned to the next move on the chessboard: What does this mean for four years from now, November 2020? It’s great to win and get your freedom, but how will this impact the next major turn of events?
We now know what happened following January 20, 2021: Vaccine mandates, political retribution, inflation, and opening the borders to tens of millions of criminals and welfare cases. The country suffered from four dark years, and it was not until late in the evening of November 5, 2024, that hope miraculously arrived.
I hate to tell you, but we could be looking at a similar scenario again for the next cycle -- except this time it could be even worse.
Hope for the best, prepare for the worst
Obviously the best scenario is if a Republican wins the Presidency in 2028. It almost doesn’t matter which one, because the alternative is dramatically worse under any but the remotest scenarios. The best Democrat is always worse than the worst Republican.
I don’t get paid to be optimistic, however. I get paid to be realistic, and I see storm clouds on the horizon that could make 2026-28 into dark years indeed, triggering a leap into the abyss on January 20, 2029.
As a result, this article is going to be a call for preparation. Life is good under the current political regime in the US right now: The borders have been closed, crime is down, the woke nonsense is in sharp retreat, and the market is near an all-time high. We don’t know what’s coming tomorrow, but as I am writing this, on September 21, 2025, we are truly living in The Golden Age in the US. The rest of the world is green with envy, and for good reason.
It is easy to become complacent, and to think that these good times -- The Golden Age -- will continue forever. Well, they won’t. The question is just whether the next turn of events happens in November 2028 or at some later political cycle. This article is meant to remind us all that it could happen in November 2028 -- and that’s barely three years from now. Enjoy it while it lasts -- because it might end then.
How the US elects Presidents all over the map
The US has shown over the last century that it is willing to elect Presidents from all sides of the political spectrum. Most recently, the US went from George Bush and the war on terrorism -- and the war on the Saddam Hussein regime -- to electing a Marxist, Barack HUSSEIN Obama -- to electing Donald Trump. If you had told someone on September 12, 2001, that the next US President would be an Islamist sympathizer, also a Marxist, named HUSSEIN, they would have laughed at you. And then, that this person would have been replaced by Donald Trump -- well, they would have called for a padded van to transport you to the nearest mental hospital. It was as inconceivable as inconceivable ever gets. Nobody predicted what would happen. Nobody.
The only reasonable explanation is that the US population is not ideological. It elects Presidents based on two main factors:
The circumstances at the time of the election
The relative charisma of the candidates
In 2008, the main circumstance was the global financial crisis, which was pinned on George Bush and where John McCain was completely inept to offer a case, either on the merits or regarding his personality.
In 2020, the main circumstance was the C-19 hysteria and its associated shutdowns and mail-in voting. It is obvious that there was widespread fraud in this election, but in addition Trump had made his own bed by ordering the shutdown of the country on March 16, 2020 (“15 days to slow the spread”). Trump had trouble arguing that the C-19 nonsense was strictly the result of Democrat Karens and their ridiculous bug paranoia.
In 2024, the main circumstance was the combination of inflation and open border, along with the sheer unattractiveness -- dementia and low intelligence -- of both Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.
You can see a pattern here: In 2008, 2020 and 2024 the voters were primarily voting AGAINST something, not FOR something. We don’t know what the theme will be in 2028, but history tells us that the probability is high that the voters will vote AGAINST something. The question is only WHO and WHAT. Who will they vote against, and what will be the issue?
Why might a Democrat win in 2028?
There are a few reasons why a Republican Presidential candidate may have a harder time in 2028 than in 2024. They mostly fall under “the economy” and that a Republican is in charge of it right now.
Inflation is on the rise again. It sank Biden-Harris in 2024. Will it sink a Republican in 2028? Of course it could.
The US dollar index -- the DXY -- is down 10% year to date. That might be survivable, but what if it declines another 10%? Americans are getting poorer.
We could be on a path to an outright sovereign debt crisis, which could trigger, for the first time in US history, a currency crisis. Then all bets are off. Government debt is at $38 trillion and rising faster than ever.
How about a plain vanilla deep recession? These have happened several times before over the last 60 years. It will happen again. We saw what happened during those times: 1980, 1992 and 2008 -- arguably also 2020. Each time, there was regime change.
As you can see, it would not take a lot for a Democrat to win in 2028. The three most recent elections -- 2016, 2020 and 2024 -- were all extremely close. If the votes moved barely 1%, the result would have been different. Could any of the factors I described above induce a shift in the population of 1% or slightly more? I see the potential as obvious.
The candidate factor: The bigger unknown
The only way to overcome a “large” circumstance such as the economic factor I described above is for a Republican to have a vastly more attractive candidate than the Democrat. Let’s first assume that the Democrats will nominate its strongest possible candidate.
Gavin Newsom
That person is clearly California Governor Gavin Newsom. Almost everyone on the right laughs at him because he has run California into the ground in almost every conceivable level, and he was a nasty tyrant during the C-19 hysteria. He’s rightly viewed as Joseph Stalin who managed to take an acting class and attend charm school.
Newsom however has one ability that other democrats don’t have: He can lie extremely well. He can tell you that crime in California is down whereas everyone in California knows it’s a lot worse now than it was before 2014, let alone 2004 or 1994. I view him as a most dangerous candidate, and we should assume he will be the Democrat candidate in 2028. Dismiss him at your peril.
JD Vance or not?
For good or for bad, JD Vance is tied to President Trump’s hip. If Trump does well -- meaning that the economy is in good shape by 2028 -- then JD will ride his career straight into The White House.
The problem is if the economy is in shambles by 2028 -- and perhaps the Republicans lost either or both houses in Congress in 2026. Then where does JD Vance stand?
Right now, it seems that no Republican is planning to challenge JD Vance for the 2028 nomination. There are two factors that could -- and would -- change this:
Republicans lose Congress in 2026
A major economic recession -- or worse -- by early 2028
Who would be able and willing to challenge JD Vance for the 2028 nomination? It can’t be someone inside the administration, because they would be tainted. It would have to be someone who could credibly say they stood up against Trump on some key issues. I see three possibilities at this point:
Ron DeSantis
Rand Paul
Ted Cruz
I like all three, and hope and believe that other good candidates would also emerge. The question is whether any of them would be able to wrestle the 2028 nomination away from JD Vance even if the Trump administration was presiding over a deep economic recession or worse.
Maybe JD Vance would simply step aside at that point, realizing that it would be a lost cause for him in 2028, and that he’s still record-young and has decades to recover. That would certainly be the smart thing to do under those circumstances.
I have no doubt that Ron DeSantis, Rand Paul and Ted Cruz would be a stronger opponent against Gavin Newsom, compared with JD Vance, if the US economy was in a deep recession by 2028. JD would have to own the recession, and that’s a big problem.
2029: A potential nightmare
Think about how you felt when Biden (or rather his handlers and autopen) took over on January 20, 2021. It was darkness and despair all around. The country was being dismantled, and all of your freedoms were taken away. Vaccine mandates. Pure dystopia.
We could end up in that situation again. If President Newsom wins in November 2028, and especially if he has a majority even in only one chamber of Congress, you may have to kiss many of your freedoms goodbye again.
The range of possibilities at that point are from extremely bad to worse. I get depressed just thinking about it.
So what is your action plan if that happens? Do you move to another country? Does the country end up in a civil war? Does the US turn into Somalia or Afghanistan?
I don’t have any answers here. I’m sorry for ruining your day.
The second-biggest crime of the century (after the Holocaust) was the vaccine mandates of 2021-22:
"...we are truly living in The Golden Age in the US.". You must be younger than I. The true Golden Age of America was the 1950s. I simply cannot comprehend how the U.S. has it so good now!
Trump is busy destroying the dollar. I never thought it'd be him (with his big portrait of Reagan over looking his desk) who would do that. But it's happening right now.
The U.S.'s support, internationally, for Israel and NATO is hardly what I want to see. Trump should be making moves towards Russia not going along with the perfidious European cartels.
Those are just two things off the top of my head. I grant you that Trump is better than the alternative and his domestic actions, as you point out, were and are gifts we desperately needed. So I'll take the good whenever and wherever.
But America between the end of WW 2 and the assassination of Jack Kennedy was the real Golden Age. Think about it Anton.
Love the quote, “He’s rightly viewed as Joseph Stalin who managed to take an acting class and attend charm school.”