A viral video that caused outrage a few years ago had Donald Trump body-slamming the cable network CNN personified as a professional wrestler. This “MAGA” fantasy was all but made a reality at a CNN town hall with the former president in New Hampshire the other night. Trump makes up for it with what my National Review colleague Michael Brendan Dougherty calls “willfulness,” a deep-seated, near-primal drive to impose what he wants, whether on a political narrative, a negotiation, a set of rules or, at the CNN town hall, an interviewer. For Republicans, there was also the advantage of Trump taking on the cable network they disdain most; he turned the much-hyped town hall into an embarrassment for its sponsor. But no one else is becoming the nominee unless at the end of the day Donald Trump is no longer the biggest person in the room.

Source: CNN May 14, 2023 05:03 UTC