The president takes an oath to uphold the Constitution. Among his duties specified in the Constitution is that he shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed. Mr. Nixon violated that when he said to Haldeman and Ehrlichman, “We’ve got to stop this Watergate investigation. Tell them it’s national security, so they should just stand down.” That’s failing to take care that the laws be faithfully executed.

That’s just one thing. With Mr. Trump you have dozens of things that amount to failing to take care that the laws be faithfully executed. For example, in volume two of the Mueller report, the president is very clearly depicted as instructing senior national security officials, senior national intelligence officials and senior legal officials to lie. And they all say, “Well I can’t say that.” And he says, “Why not?” And they say, “Because that’s not true.” And the president basically says, “Your point?” And that’s just one in a litany of such examples.

You seem to be betting on the idea that character matters to voters more than most Republicans seem to think. But given how much the Republican Party has been willing to overlook with regard to the president’s conduct in and out of office, are there enough people for whom character still does matter?

Many people are saying today, and correctly so, we don’t want people just to bash Mr. Trump. We want to hear what they’re going to do. The point you make about character is a positive point, not just a negative one.

So when I answer that question, I say my point, number one, is I’m an economic conservative. And no one is doing anything about the jobs we’re going to lose with artificial intelligence and drones and robotics and self-driving vehicles. We’re just kind of whistling past the graveyard there. Those are Trump voters who are going to be displaced, the long-haul truckers who are not going to have a job when self-driving trucks come in. You could make it possible for displaced workers to get free instruction for technical skills for roughly 2 years, particularly if you beef up online curricula.

But there are 20 states where unenrolled voters, independent voters, can vote in the Republican primary.