Republicans’ assumptions about the 2024 presidential and congressional elections are, it worries me to say, missing some tough underlying realities. President Biden may be much harder to beat than we currently think. The Democrats’ potential to hold on to the Senate and win back the House may be much larger than we can imagine.

I have spent a lot of time thinking through the elections in 2020, 2022, and 2023. All of us who strongly want a Republican victory in 2024 — and believe the Biden-Harris ticket must be defeated — should think deeply about the scale of the machine we are facing. 

The report that one Democratic group is buying $5.9 million in ads in the special election for the 3rd District of New York is a small example of what is coming. The Republican nominee, Mazi Pilip, is a solid candidate. She is a woman of color born in Ethiopia. Her parents emigrated to Israel, and she served as a paratrooper in the Israeli Defense Force. She came to America and currently serves in the Nassau County legislature. 

As a replacement for Representative George Santos, who was expelled for corruption, Ms. Pilip would normally have every advantage in the special election since Long Island went overwhelmingly Republican in the 2023 elections. The radical Democrats’ policies toward crime, taxes, illegal immigration (and the Democratic governor’s proposal to build multi-family housing in single household neighborhoods) led to a Republican sweep last November.

The Democrats know they will probably lose a normal election to Ms. Pilip. Therefore, they have decided to change the context of the election. There will be more groups piling in more money, paid workers, and organized volunteers. 

The teachers’ union, the government employees’ unions, the AFL-CIO, the Service Employees International Union, and a host of other organizations will be piling on. Radical environmental and sexual identity groups will rally to the opportunity to defeat a Republican. 

Despite all these Democratic efforts, Republicans have a real chance to win if they can find enough resources. However, what should have been an easy election will now become a real power struggle with important meaning for the general election.

It is important to recognize that while Republicans look at campaigns and polls, Democrats look at Election Day (or election weeks as it has evolved) and brute organizational strength.

While the Congress slowly and steadily gathers evidence about alleged Biden family corruption, there is a much deeper corruption underway in the country at-large. This larger and deeper corruption will keep Mr. Biden in the race despite all his weaknesses as a candidate and failures as a president.

Start with the simple fact that the Biden administration in fiscal 2024 will spend $1.59 trillion in discretionary spending. That breaks down into $886 billion for defense and $704 billion for domestic discretionary. In just one area, the Biden administration by August 2022 had announced $408 billion in domestic utility development as part of its green corruption program.

The Biden money coalition is overwhelmingly made up of people who either get money from the government or want the government to coerce people into doing something they would not normally do.

Every member of the Biden money coalition recognizes that a Republican victory will be the end of their gravy train and potentially the end of their world. They are literally fighting for their own survival both economically and psychologically.

The Biden money coalition will be coming together aggressively and with massive resources in 2024 because they are fighting for themselves. Their cause is their government contracts, their access to regulators who protect them and punish their competitors, their ability to loot government contracts and not face a hostile Department of Justice. 

A huge government can draw taxes from the many to provide, in Grover Norquist’s excellent language, “favors for the few.” Those “few” are the millionaires and billionaires who are going to sponsor so many superPACs, fund so many special projects, subsidize so many supposedly non-political education groups, provide millions to Black Lives Matter, the Sierra Club, and pro-trans groups. Their hope is that sheer energy and money can drown the larger reality that their programs are unpopular. Their corruption and insider status is deeply offensive to virtually all Americans.

The scale of the left’s coalition, the desperation of its fear of change, and the deep sense that a Republican sweep could undo two generations of the left’s agenda drives the scale of the fight we are facing.

Republicans must not go into 2024 thinking this will be a normal election. This will be a real challenge — and the radicals know everything they value is at stake. We must be ready to win.