She has taken power when the state governor stepped outside of state lines. She has sought to ferret out what she calls indoctrination in schools. She has petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to oppose the “illegal election” of Joe Biden and vowed to reject federal money and the strings attached to it.
Now, Janice McGeachin, Idaho’s Lieutenant-Governor and one of Donald Trump’s earliest public supporters, can boast the backing of the former president as she seeks to become governor of the deeply Republican state in the latest attempt by Mr. Trump to extend his influence – and tumult – on the U.S. political system.
“I am giving Janice McGeachin my Complete and Total Endorsement to be the next Governor of Idaho,” Mr. Trump said in a statement this week. “She will make a fantastic Governor, and will never let you down!”
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Mr. Trump’s brand of politics has been powerfully resonant in Idaho, with nearly two-thirds of voters supporting him in the 2020 presidential election. And Ms. McGeachin has fashioned herself in his image. In October, she seized control of the state’s government, using her powers as Lieutenant-Governor to take executive action when Governor Brad Little was away. (Her ban on vaccine mandates was overturned when Mr. Little came back to Idaho.)
Mr. Trump’s “endorsement shows Idahoans that just as Trump put America first, he believes I am the candidate who will put Idaho first,” Ms. McGeachin said in a statement responding to questions from The Globe and Mail. She added: “I am standing in the gap for Idahoans. Trump did this as president with the American people, and it’s what I intend to do as the next governor of Idaho.”
Mr. Trump may have lost the White House and his Twitter account, but by some measures, his political influence is growing.
In 2018, he endorsed 49 candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives. Of them, 29 won, or 59 per cent. In 2020, 116 of 149 Trump-backed candidates won in the House, or 78 per cent. His success rate was similar in the U.S. Senate, according to numbers tracked by Ballotpedia. This year, Mr. Trump endorsed candidates for governor of Virginia and mayor of Hialeah, Fla. Both won.
In Idaho, Ms. McGeachin is considered an underdog against Mr. Little, a deeply conservative governor who, absent a challenger from the right, had little reason to fear for his political career. Republicans have ruled the state since 1995.
But by the time Mr. Trump became president in 2016, Idaho politics was changing, driven in part by a libertarian group, the Idaho Freedom Foundation, that launched in 2009 and has fought taxes, regulation and dependency on the federal government. The foundation has claimed considerable success in steering the state’s legislative agenda, and Ms. McGeachin has supported some of its aims.
For example, she has accused teachers of poisoning classrooms with critical race theory, and led a task force to “examine indoctrination in Idaho education and to protect our young people.”
That effort did not get great public favour. Nearly 70 per cent of comments to the task force were negative. Some denied the existence of classroom indoctrination, others condemned the task force mandate. Still others criticized Ms. McGeachin.
Mr. Trump’s endorsement could elevate her standing. “Trump is well thought-of, not just by people likely to vote in the primary, but by less politically active Idahoans. And it will motivate them to go to the polls,” said Bjorn Handeen, a regional Republican chair in the state.
“It’s obvious that there’s two different wings of the Republican Party, not just in Idaho but across the U.S., so Trump weighing in is a signal to Idahoans that identify with the conservative wing.”
Mr. Little has been attacked as a Republican in name only, in particular over his support for vaccination. To Trump backers, “he is the swamp,” said Bryan Zollinger, a lawyer who served in the Idaho House of Representatives from 2016 to 2020.
Some called Ms. McGeachin irresponsible when she took executive action in Mr. Little’s absence. “People think of it as antics,” Mr. Zollinger said. “But it’s really that she’s not afraid to act and follow the will of the people. She has the courage to do that.”
“Brad Little is the Mitt Romney of Idaho,” he added. “And Janice is looked at more as the Donald Trump of Idaho.”
Jim Jones, a former chief justice of the Idaho Supreme Court who is now a vocal critic of Mr. Trump, doubts that will lift her into the governor’s office. “McGeachin is a hard product to sell, I think, for the average Republican,” he said. He faults her for extremist views. “I would be hard-pressed to think of anything positive that she has done to make life better for anybody in the state,” he said. She and her supporters are “so disruptive and divisive. And people are getting tired of that. They want to get responsible government.”
And, he says, “I suspect that we may see that across the country, to an extent.”
But there is also evidence to the contrary. Earlier this year, the Idaho Republican Party voted no confidence in Mike Simpson, a Republican who has served in the U.S. Congress since 1999. Mr. Simpson has “never lost a primary,” said Bob Kustra, the former president of Boise State University who previously was Republican governor of Illinois. Now Mr. Simpson is acting like he is “scared out of his wits” by those aligned with Mr. Trump and against him, Mr. Kustra said.
“This is the Trump year,” he said. And when it comes to those Mr. Trump supports, “you have to take them very seriously in terms of their potential of getting elected.”
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