Republican Party Doomed to Be Extinct If It Backtracks: Mike Huckabee

Then-Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in New York City on Nov. 18, 2016. Spencer Platt/Getty Images

The Republican Party must stick to the working class or face the fate of becoming extinct, a former governor warned.

“Let’s hope it doesn’t go back to the days of globalists, the days of just basically being servants to the big multinational corporations, that we become the party of the country clubs and the swells. Because if we do that we are destined to become extinct. And we should be,” former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, a Republican, said during an interview with Fox Business.

The former governor said the Republican Party must care about the American people.

“We’ve got to be the party of the working class. The party that cares about America, the party that believes that patriotism is okay, that it’s fine to want to make sure that Americans and the American Dream is alive and well,” he said. “If we focus on that, I still think that’s a winning message.”

Huckabee made the comments in response to a question about the anti-Trump narrative after the midterm elections on some media, including some right-leaning news outlets.

He acknowledged that the Republican Party is facing many challenges, including not having enough voters among the young generation, being censored on social media, and being entangled by the bureaucracy of government.

He didn’t specifically name former President Donald Trump during his remarks.

Former President Donald Trump and former First Lady Melania Trump speak to the media while departing a polling station after voting in the midterm elections at Morton and Barbara Mandel Recreation Center in Palm Beach, Fla., on Nov. 8, 2022. Eva Marie Uzcategui/AFP via Getty Images

However, making the Republican Party a working-class party was one of Trump’s main campaign messages back in the 2016 election.

“Five, 10 years from now—different party. You’re going to have a worker’s party. A party of people that haven’t had a real wage increase in 18 years, that are angry,” he told Bloomberg in 2016 when he was asked about his perspective on the GOP.

Trump also reinforced the domestic manufacturing sector and increased employment through his “America First” policies, though his efforts were somewhat disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Republican Party at a Crossroads for 2024

Though the Republican Party still has a chance to control Congress, especially the lower chamber, some conservatives who anticipated a red wave during the midterm elections felt disappointed with the results and blamed former president Donald Trump.

It caused an internal argument among Republicans about who should lead the Republican Party and run in 2024.

Some said Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who just won his reelection with a landslide, should lead.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, with his wife, Casey DeSantis, and children Madison, Mason, and Mamie, waves to the crowd during an election night watch party at the Convention Center in Tampa, Fla., on Nov. 8, 2022. Giorgio Viera/AFP via Getty Images

However, the former president—who is scheduled to make a “very big announcement” at Mar-a-Lago on Nov. 15—said his endorsed candidates secured a “very big victory” in the midterms.

“While in certain ways yesterday’s election was somewhat disappointing, from my personal standpoint it was a very big victory—219 WINS and 16 Losses in the General—Who has ever done better than that?” Trump wrote in a post on his Truth Social account on Wednesday.