How Trump muscled his way to the Republican nomination

It represents one of the greatest political comebacks in American history

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WASHINGTON - Some of the Republican Party's most influential donors gathered 16 months ago in Las Vegas to consider potential 2024 presidential candidates. The 2022 US midterm results had just embarrassed the party, and the chatter in the room laid the blame on Donald Trump.

It was time to move on, several donors told Reuters. The former president was a has-been, a drag on Republican fortunes, they said. An opinion poll a short time later showed him only 6 percentage points ahead of the Republican field.

Fast-forward, and today Trump is effectively the nominee, his grip on the Republican Party tighter than ever. After a wavering campaign launch in November 2022, he surged ahead in opinion polls and his Republican rivals were never able to catch up.

How he did that - after two impeachments and multiple criminal indictments represents one of the greatest political comebacks in United States history.

That weekend in Las Vegas, while Trump spoke to a gathering of the Republican Jewish Coalition via video, much of the interest lay with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who gave a well-received keynote speech and looked poised to challenge Trump for the nomination.

Now, Mr DeSantis is an afterthought after running a poor campaign in which he failed to live up to the early hype that he was Trump's natural successor. Former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley, the lone remaining challenger to Trump, exited the race on March 6 after a defiant but ultimately hopeless last stand.

Some opinion polls show Trump as the favourite against the Democratic incumbent, President Joe Biden, in the November election, although many Americans remain undecided.

"It's totally nuts. Most defeated presidents don't come back and run," said Dr Lindsay Chervinsky, a presidential historian at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. "There is no reason to think he should have won the nomination, especially this fast."