It was 2016, and a scandal-tarred Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump was limping toward the finish line in a race against Hillary Clinton. About his wildly dysfunctional campaign, New York Magazine's Gabriel Sherman indicated a few weeks before November 8th that Trump's top advisers were “starting to position themselves for what comes after a loss.” Crucial for the purposes of this piece was how early the positioning began. An old campaign hand from Mitt Romney's 2012 presidential run told Sherman that “it's a window into a campaign in a downward spiral when the positioning begins.” Applied to Trump's then-freefalling run for the White House, the established vet told Sherman that “I've never seen it begin this early.”
And for readers prone to dismiss the musings of someone close to Trump's then enemy in Romney, Sherman also asked a senior Trump adviser to provide a sense of the scene inside Trump 2016 HQ. He responded with “Think of the bunker before Hitler killed himself.” Lest we forget, Trump was set to lose to Clinton, and lose big.
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