Somehow, we made it! After four years of Joe Biden at the helm — or, more accurately, after four years of Joe Biden asleep at the beach while his cronies ran the country into the ground — it’s finally 2025, and we are mere days away from Donald Trump’s second presidential term.

But as we find ourselves on the edge of glory — or, at the very least, the edge of change — this is also a time to reflect: something our movement has struggled with in recent years.

Yes, Donald Trump won the election, but as is always the case in politics, this short-term reading of the country is just that: short-term. Before we know it, we’ll be facing the reality of the 2026 midterm elections — with midterms being notoriously difficult for the sitting executive — and then we’ll do this all again in 2028. With that in mind, we can’t afford to skip a beat, and our movement must look forward, keep growing and decide what we actually stand for.

Identity

In 2026 and 2028 (and beyond), Trump will not be on the ballot. For the first time in well over a decade, the Republican Party will be reckoning with the reality of a post-Trump world. While Trump and MAGA were effective vehicles for victory in 2016 and 2024 — with major hiccups before, during and after 2020 — we’ll be forced to answer whether this momentum can continue without Trump. The Republican Party must prepare for this eventuality and decide what its identity is without the big bad orange man at the forefront.

Winning again is harder than just winning

This year, Donald Trump won largely because Joe Biden was an unmitigated disaster, and Americans — correctly — believed that life was better under President Trump than President Biden. And in 2016, Donald Trump won largely because Hillary Clinton was laughably unpopular.

In 2016 and 2024, Trump won as an outsider. In 2020, Trump lost as the insider.

This highlights a problem for Trump and a Republican Party that has grappled with low approval ratings when they can’t rely on the stunning unpopularity of Joe Biden — a geriatric imbecile who can’t keep solid foods down — and Kamala Harris — a cackling DEI-hire whose rise to power was built solely on attaching herself to various powerful men. Not only will Donald Trump be serving his final term as president; he will be running on a new record against a new Democrat whose entire platform can return to their standard set of promises of a left-wing utopia.

With no failing incumbent to hide behind, it’s simple. For conservatives to keep winning, Trump has to deliver.

What are our values?

Finally, the conservative movement made a lot of concessions in return for victory this election season, including welcoming — voluntarily or otherwise — a wide range of Democrats into our midst as part of the “big tent” strategy. But regardless of whether or not radical progressive figures like RFK Jr. helped achieve an electoral win for Trump, their presence in a campaign was abstract. Their presence in an actual administration is concrete.

And in a concrete world, the conservative movement needs a concrete platform of values. So, what are these values? Does fiscal conservatism matter anymore? Is this a pro-life party? Are we fighting for a smaller government?

If victory remains all that matters, then values will become valueless, and there will soon be no difference between the Democratic and Republican parties beyond decor. If we care about why we want to win, then the why still matters, and we can’t fight for our values until we agree on what these values are.

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