For most of the Republicans running for president in 2024, their goal is to bring the GOP—and the country—into the post-Trump era.
But one longshot hopeful is poised to try something else: contending for the White House almost as if Trump had never happened.
Mike Rogers, the former seven-term Michigan congressman who left office months before Trump launched his campaign in 2015, shares the relentless optimism and consummate politeness of a different Mr. Rogers—not the fire-and-brimstone rhetoric of contemporary GOP politicians.
As Rogers travels across the early primary states of Iowa and New Hampshire for intimate events, the scorched-earth battleground of the 2024 GOP primary seems like just another beautiful day in the neighborhood.
Coming off his fifth visit to the Granite State, the steel-jawed 59-year old former FBI agent and onetime House Intelligence Committee chairman thinks he has a real shot at the presidency, should he decide to take the plunge.
That’s despite few people outside of Michigan knowing who he is—and the generally abysmal track record even for sitting House members in running for the presidency.
What’s more, if the prospective GOP field were represented by a buffet table—starting first with the reddest of the red meat for the party base—Rogers might occupy a lonely spot at the far end, by the salad bar, with his central issue of childhood literacy something akin to a vat of kale.
“We’re talking about a different kind of a campaign that’s based on a solutions-oriented, optimistic future for the United States,” Rogers told The Daily Beast during a phone interview after a house party in Keene, New Hampshire. “And it seems that we’re getting really good interest in having maybe a new way forward here after a very rough and tumble few years in politics in America.”
Instead of talking about drag shows or fearmongering over urban crime or complaining about his criminal indictment, Rogers really just wants to talk about childhood literacy. A lot.
“To me, there is significant data about the literacy crisis in America,” Rogers said in a pared-down version of what’s starting to look like a stump speech, “and all of the problems that brings with it.”
This is his hook for small crowds who may have no idea who he is, similar to the way Andrew Yang—another little-known longshot—rattled off startling statistics about automation and the labor market in the 2020 Democratic primary, earning himself a surprising foothold in the race.
While acknowledging his top issue isn’t a “silver bullet” for the Republic’s woes, Rogers argues that catching students up to speed on reading will have myriad knock-on effects that will help both the nation’s economy and democracy.
“It is a huge problem for America,” he continued. “This is adding to all of the fuel of all of these other problems.”
Rogers is betting that primary voters might crave a sober, issues-based campaign plucked out of the 1990s as an antidote to the Trump years, rather than repackaged Trumpism, much less the original thing.
It’s audacious for a number of reasons. The Mike Rogers with far more name ID in politics right now, for one, is the Alabama congressman—the House Armed Services Chairman—who briefly gained notoriety for trying to punch out Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) on the House floor during January’s protracted Speaker battle.
Beyond that, fellow longshots believe that the path to GOP relevance rests on serving up juicy tomahawk steaks to the party base. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, for instance, has found a 2024 audience in waging a relentlessly anti-woke campaign to a culture war-obsessed party.
What may be strangest about Rogers, though, is how little he seems to be preoccupied with both Trump and Biden. That puts him in a lane somewhat separate from a potential anti-Trump candidate, like former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.
“I supported many of former President Trump’s policies,” Rogers said. “Like a growing number of Americans, though, the folks I talk with on a daily basis are looking for new leadership—a conservative leader who is focused on bold solutions to the problems they face every day, a leader who is focused on the real issues, not just sugar high politics and the tweet of the day.”
The obvious problem, of course, is that the sugar high politics are more potent than ever. Although there are overwhelming headwinds facing his nascent bid, Rogers’ performance—should he run—could offer some interesting signals about the mood of the electorate.
“We have a Nevada trip planned, and the conversations have been going well, and we keep getting invited back,” Rogers said.
Rogers said he’s even gotten invitations to house parties from Republicans who voted for Trump in both 2016 and 2020, people who “are tired of the sugar high, I slap you, you slap me, I get lots of Facebook likes, Twitter followers, and nothing changes” brand of politics.
Notably, Rogers briefly served on Trump’s transition team after the 2016 election. He described his role there to The Daily Beast as “get[ting] the national security team ready for prime time. That’s exactly what I did.”
Were it not for a confluence of factors involving long-standing beef between Jared Kushner and Christie over the arrest and incarceration of the Trump son-in-law’s father, Charles Kushner, Rogers might have ended up as a Trump administration official. When Kushner ousted Christie from his role leading the Trump transition, Rogers—a close ally of Christie’s—left too.
Still, Rogers was even considered for the role of FBI director after Trump infamously fired James Comey.
Instead, Rogers spent recent years as a CNN talking head and working in the quantum computing and AI spaces, warning that the U.S. is behind the curve on protecting sensitive data.
In a recent guest op-ed for Cyberscoop, Rogers wrote about the “imperative that U.S government agencies and private sector corporations immediately begin migrating vulnerable cybersecurity protocols to post-quantum cryptography (PQC).”
Those sorts of issues—cybersecurity, intelligence, defense—were what Rogers was known for when he was in Congress. And his hawkish, often neo-conservative views on those topics at the time frequently positioned him against his fellow Michigan Republican, former Rep. Justin Amash, who left the party over Trump and, ironically, would also like to scrub Trump’s influence from national politics.
In an early primary contest marked by a cold-war-turned-hot between Trump and Ron DeSantis-aligned armies of influencers, there may be an appetite among the party base for an enlightened discussion on the future of AI and computers requiring refrigeration at negative 459 degrees Fahrenheit—but it has yet to reveal itself.
If that appetite emerges anywhere first, it’d likely be New Hampshire, the first primary state.
Dante Scala, a professor of political science at the University of New Hampshire, told The Daily Beast that candidates with Rogers’ kind of profile “would be more likely to appeal in New Hampshire than just about any of the other early primary states.” In 2016, for instance, the moderate Ohio Gov. John Kasich placed second to Trump in the Granite State primary.
Yet Scala quickly pointed out that despite the New Hampshire primary allowing the participation of independent voters, winning enough of them to outmaneuver whoever commands the Republican base would require a herculean effort.
“It’s the presidential candidate’s equivalent of a lottery ticket,” Scala said of the “mythological independent voter in New Hampshire.”
“It’s a dollar and a dream that you, this modern bipartisan candidate, will attract the lion’s share of these non-partisan independents and shock the world,” he said. “That’s the myth, right? But like any myth, there’s an element of truth to it.”
Rogers seems to think so, even if the effort required of the childhood literacy champion is more sisyphean than herculean.
There have been rumblings that Rogers, who represented central Michigan in the House, might run for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D) next year.
Asked if he’s still considering a Senate bid, Rogers didn’t rule it out, but sounded more interested in a presidential campaign.
“You never say never in politics,” Rogers said. “But right now my goal is to help the country try to realign our efforts. And remember, anger should never be a destination. It should be a motivation to solve problems. We’re trying to get people in that ‘motivation to solve problems’ lane.”
Rogers, of course, is not the only Republican to eye such a lane. Another who did, former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, had far more name recognition and fundraising prowess—but he decided against a run.
“If Larry Hogan couldn’t see a path for himself,” asked Scala, “why would Mike Rogers?”
