Can Trump hold his disparate coalition together?

Decades ago, conservatives told a joke that went like this: If members of FDR’s New Deal coalition ever met in one place, a fistfight would surely break out.

After all, what did a Rust Belt union worker have in common with a San Francisco gay rights activist? Or a Northern liberal with a Southern segregationist? And yet, that unwieldy coalition held together for decades.

Today, it’s MAGA that finds itself as the big-tent coalition full of internal contradictions. The question is, how long can it last?

Trump’s coalition encompasses a messy mix: McDonald’s fast-food enthusiasts and RFK Jr. devotees worried about ultra-processed foods and seed oils; rural farmers harmed by Trump’s tariffs; and both hawkish internationalists like soon-to-be Secretary of State Marco Rubio and non-interventionists like Tucker Carlson.

And that’s just the insiders. Among Trump voters, you’ll find staunch pro-lifers alongside pro-choice voters who assume Trump secretly agrees with them; working-class Hispanics alongside immigration restrictionists who want mass deportations and an end to birthright citizenship; and populists who demand entitlements remain untouched alongside fiscal hawks calling for deep spending cuts.

Holding this coalition together will be one of Trump’s greatest challenges in his second term. It’s a happy dilemma, but also a test of political skill.

Cracks are already showing. Last week’s government funding brinkmanship highlighted tensions between budget hawks and Trump-aligned populists, spilling over into a related dispute with conservative Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas). At the heart of the clash was Trump’s proposal to raise or eliminate the debt ceiling — a move intended to reduce fiscal drama but one that would also eliminate a key point of leverage fiscal conservatives rely on to negotiate spending cuts.

In his first term, Trump’s strategy — making the debt and deficits disappear as a headline issue — largely worked. Trump also profited from his ability to send people checks in the mail — much like FDR did with the New Deal. But FDR’s coalition did not include fiscal conservatives like Roy. And with a narrower House majority this time, losing even a handful of them (Trump has threatened a primary against Roy in Texas) could derail key initiatives

Then there’s Elon Musk, Trump’s wildcard and co-chair of the planned Department of Government Efficiency. Musk’s intervention to sink a bipartisan deal brokered by Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) (whose status in Trumpworld now seems fraught) has raised the question of whether Musk was freelancing or doing Trump’s bidding. Either way, his wealth and popularity create a new dynamic — and a potential frenemy for Trump to navigate.

The larger issue is that a growing coalition always involves strange bedfellows. MAGA includes scandal-plagued figures like former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) and Secretary of Defense designee Pete Hegseth, alongside Christian conservatives who preach morality and family values. For now, Trump’s evangelical base seems unshakable, but newer members of the Trump coalition — such as pro-choice voters or working-class Hispanics — may be less forgiving if contradictions pile up.

A Catch-22 of politics is the fact that once you start governing and making decisions, you’re almost guaranteed to alienate some of the people who put you in office in the first place. It requires finesse to manage, and finesse isn’t exactly Trump’s strong suit.

At least one prominent conservative is voicing concern about this. In a column titled, “No Circular Firing Squad,” Kurt Schlichter writes, “Our new coalition is not just conservatives. We conservatives make up a big chunk of it, but it’s also populists, anti-war folks who reject the old foreign policy consensus, as well as RFK granola/crunchy Make America Healthy Again types. Organized labor has an unprecedented presence too.”

“Our Trump coalition is a new thing,” Schlichter continued, “a potentially unstable thing. We’re going to have growing pains.”

Schlichter is right: Growing pains can either be a natural part of evolution — or the sign of deeper instability. Some coalitions endure, while others fracture under their own weight.

The Reagan coalition managed its contradictions through “fusionism,” uniting diverse factions (social, fiscal and national security conservatives) under the common goal of defeating communism. But after the Berlin Wall fell, the coalition lost its unifying purpose. In the decades that followed, attempts to replace communism with radical Islamism as the new enemy largely failed.

MAGA, in contrast, is united less by ideology and more by Trump’s personality and a shared sense of grievance against elites. For now, that’s enough to hold it together.

But will the coalition’s contradictions ultimately tear it apart? Trump’s ability to navigate these challenges will define his second presidency. By this time next year, we’ll likely know the answer.

Matt K. Lewis is a columnist, podcaster and author of the books “Too Dumb to Fail” and “Filthy Rich Politicians.”