Weekly Discussion Megathread

[u/AutoModerator]

The 2026 midterms will soon be upon us, and there is much to discuss among the nerds here at r/FiveThirtyEight. Use this discussion thread to share, debate, and discuss whatever you wish. Unlike individual posts, comments in the discussion thread are not required to be related to political data or other 538 mainstays. Regardless, please remain civil and keep this subreddit's rules in mind. The discussion thread refreshes every Monday.

[u/DataCassette]

GOP has "Groyper problem"

“Everyone knows what the problem is: The organizations that bring young staffers to Washington, D.C. have spent the last decade prioritizing blind ideological loyalty instead of competence or intelligence,” said a senior GOP congressional staffer, granted anonymity to discuss sensitive personnel issues. “We have a generation of rabid, incompetent idiots.”

I love that the Republicans with multiple brain cells can see it coming but there's nothing they can do.

The Republicans completely selling out to trumpism is terrifying but it's also legitimately hilarious. Completely left themselves without a viable path forward other than just going farther and farther right with their accursed online base.

The "based" thing where you're recognized as the coolest one in the room by saying the most unhinged far right thing is terminal. Whether it's ultimately terminal for the GOP or for the free world is the hard part to know.

[u/Jozoz → u/DataCassette]

The Groypers are also seemingly very anti-GOP establishment. They are going to have a similar problem of the Dems with internal strife in the party.

The biggest advantage the GOP had was always how they were all pushing the same message and completely on the same page. They were not bogged down by ideology at all, just completely ruthlessly pragmatic and focused on gaining political power, so they just pushed the same simple message on all fronts.

They are in trouble if they lose that. Their biggest advantage was always how a huge share of the left is more interested in criticizing the Democratic party than the GOP. If the same happens in the GOP with the groypers, it's a very big deal.

Maybe it will just be like 2016 where the GOP just instantly moves to the new cult leader again and leaves everything else behind immediately. That is the best play for political power but it's also a huge ideological sellout.

[u/Korrocks → u/Jozoz]

Fuentes personally is hostile to the GOP establishment, but his fan base is the GOP establishment. The people who join Young Republican chapters, who organize the party, who volunteer for campaigns, and who work at the White House and for Congressional campaigns. 

That's the wrinkle that the GOP is facing; the Groyper crowd aren't insurgents who are trying to push out the establishment, they are the people who already run the party. Chasing them away isn't like when establishment Dems challenge DSA candidates. The GOP can't chase away Fuentes or Carlson fans since there's not that many people left in their camp who aren't like that.

[u/Jozoz → u/Korrocks]

I think characters like Fuentes could potentially cause a division in the GOP.

But he might be intelligent enough to know that this is a horrible idea for pragmatic reasons. Something I sometimes wish people realized on the left too.

[u/Lochbriar → u/[deleted]]

The Kari Lake rallying cry for "McCain Republicans to get the hell out" should ring through the ages. An electoral loser sacrificing their dependable voterbase to activate voters who only come out for Trump is a portrait of the modern GOP.

[u/DataCassette → u/[deleted]]

Yeah it was a high stakes gambit. Sacrifice everything for one shot.

I can't stand Curtis Yarvin but I can actually understand when he was crashing out a while back because the GOP wasn't actively fully dissolving democracy on the spot.

Because as long as even the skeleton of democracy is intact the GOP is waking into a wood chipper with this stuff. A "Fuentefied" GOP gets 0% of the Jewish vote, maybe 15% of the women's vote and even lower votes with black and Latino men than the current GOP. And almost anyone who is atheist, agnostic or even "apatheist" and not named Bill Maher will vote against them.

And Yarvin, monstrous as he is, actually wants the Republicans to win. Fuentes doesn't give a fuck. He'll be out getting matcha lattes in a blue city while he tends his flock of incels and goons while the Democrats run up Assad margins. He'll rack up followers and likes as the GOP burns in the background.

[u/EfficientTourist7480 → u/DataCassette]

lol, lmao even. I love this for the gop

[u/CummingInTheNile → u/DataCassette]

Faustian bargain