Former Trump adviser and long-time Republican operative Roger Stone stated in a recent interview that he could envision a scenario where President Trump does not run for re-election in 2020.
Citing a preference to be accepted by the American people, Stone told the American Spectator that Trump “doesn’t like the fact that half the people in the country hate his guts” and that “he’s hypersensitive to criticism.”
The media, consistently badgering the President and portraying him as a racist, misogynistic bigot, has to weigh on the President. Would it weigh so heavily that he’d have to walk away after only four years? Stone seems to think so.
“I could easily see him saying, ‘Well, I made America great, I’m heading to the golf course. Mike, good luck,'” Stone believes.
The comments seem to piggyback off of claims Stone made this past May, in which he felt if Trump had accomplished all of his goals in a reasonable amount of time, he’d bow out.
No Trump in 2020 seems unlikely
One glaringly obvious unkept goal still sticks out like a sore thumb on the Trump agenda – the border wall.
The President, still to this day, continues to battle with Congress over funding for a border wall he made a staple of his successful 2016 campaign. Not fulfilling that goal would forever haunt him, both politically as a legacy matter and as a personal matter in which Trump finds it necessary to secure America’s borders.
Will Trump get that funding? Will the wall finally be completed? It’s going to be a heck of a lot harder now that Democrats are set to take control of the House. Trump has demanded $5 billion in funding, and even threatened a government shutdown if he doesn’t get it.
Mexico should move the flag waving Migrants, many of whom are stone cold criminals, back to their countries. Do it by plane, do it by bus, do it anyway you want, but they are NOT coming into the U.S.A. We will close the Border permanently if need be. Congress, fund the WALL!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 26, 2018
“I think probably, if I was ever going to do a shutdown over border security, when you look at the caravans, when you look at the mess, when you look at the people coming in, this would be a very good time to do a shutdown,” Trump said.
Without that victory secured, there are no reasonable means in which Trump could walk away and claim all goals were met, as Stone suggests as a necessary scenario.
Even with that in mind, there are other reasons to be skeptical of Stone’s comments. The President has already confirmed that he’s running again in 2020, even tapping the former digital director of his campaign, Brad Parscale, to manage his re-election bid.
Stone makes news in the Mueller probe
Aside from his 2020 prediction, Stone had additional commentary on the Mueller probe that ranks as newsworthy.
Stone stated that he “wouldn’t take a deal if offered one by Mueller because he would have to ‘fabricate something.'”
In an exclusive interview with The Political Insider, the long-time Trump associate admitted Special Counsel Robert Mueller was trying to pin something on him and alleged that investigators are full of Democrats out to destroy the President.
Stone has landed on Mueller’s radar over a tweet he wrote saying “it will soon (be) the Podesta’s time in the barrel,” a message critics claim showed he had prior knowledge of Wikileaks’ plans to release Podesta’s emails and thus supposed evidence of collusion.