(CNN) - It
has brought together the same people.
Try a similar schedule.
He even believes he has encountered an 11-hour equivalent scandal, and the equivalent Russian misinformation doubts have continued.
All that is missing is the plane.
Routine-loving and superstitious politician, President Donald Trump actively works to replicate the atmosphere that culminated in his 2016 victory, convinced that if the same pieces are in place as he rampages across battlefields at breakneck pace - as did last time - will follow the results of lighting in a bottle.
He's even started to think longingly about his jet, a Boeing 757 painted red and gold, that used to roam the country during the hectic final stretch of 2016.
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“I have exactly the same plane at home.
It is true.
Exactly the same, ”Trump said Friday on a hot runway in Florida, pointing to the blue-and-white government plane of the same model, but with much less gold, located nearby.
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"It's a different company that makes the engines," he said, quickly identifying a deficiency compared to his own plane.
"I think those are Pratt & Whitney, and I have Rolls-Royce."
Nostalgia has always weighed heavily on Trump's political personality (it's the second "A" in his "MAGA" motto), but it also affects his decisions and strategy, often against the advice of his political team, according to people who they have spoken to him recently about his re-election efforts.
As he makes a final arrest for a second term, Trump wants to replicate the heady final days of his only previous political campaign, even though he is now the incumbent and the political calculus has changed dramatically.
But this time, Trump seems more aggrieved by what has happened to him than by what has happened to the base of people who support him.
Traveling across the country this weekend, the collection of advisers who joined him in the small forward cabin aboard Air Force One included 2016 veteran advisers Jared Kushner, Stephen Miller, Dan Scavino and Hope Hicks, a whom Trump convinced to return to their orbit eight months ago.
Some of the more recent additions to his circle were absent, notably his secretary Mark Meadows.
As he did many times in 2016, Trump will stay in his Las Vegas hotel for two days while raising cash across the border in Orange County and holding campaign rallies in Arizona.
He even attends the same evangelical church a few miles from the strip that he visited in October 2016, when pastors and ministers gathered to lay hands on him and pray.
Like four years ago, Trump hopes that by beating his rival - three rallies a day, often extending beyond 90 minutes, in every state in which he participates - he can achieve a victory that defies polls and experts.
Once seemingly out of reach due to the viral pandemic ravaging the country, Trump has insisted that his campaign events continue, convinced that they are what prompted him to take office the first time.
They have gotten bigger as the calendar moves towards November 3, although it is unlikely they will ever match the tens of thousands who ever came to hear him speak.
And he goes headlong to make unsubstantiated accusations against Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden of being a "criminal" who, in Trump's words, sits at the top of an obscure syndicate of politicians for personal gain.
It's the exact accusation he used to bring against Hillary Clinton (and still does, despite the fact that he defeated her), even as he is again being aided by a Russian disinformation campaign targeting Biden.
The president has often lamented that his political efforts since entering the White House have felt serious compared to his efforts four years ago, said people who have spoken to him, overwhelmed by the massive apparatus that accompanies any president and charged with the responsibilities of a holder.
Trump has fondly remembered those final days of the 2016 campaign as the last in which he was relieved by the job he finally won, and he wants to feel the same excitement as his first round.
He likes to remember what it was like in the days leading up to the elections and recounts the 2016 election night at almost every event he attends.
"That beautiful night four years ago was the best of all time, probably the best night in the history of television," Trump said in Janesville, Wisconsin, Saturday night as a crowd roared in approval.
"We had lots of fun.
The tears that flowed, do you remember the tears? "
Former officials also say Trump is on a superstitious streak and believe that if his campaign circumstances are aligned similarly, from the crowd to the rallies to the rhetoric, he could win again.
Yet a bit like a college freshman trying to gather friends over Thanksgiving break, only to find that everyone has changed, Trump discovers that nostalgic reminiscence can't always manifest itself in reality.
The burdens of being the incumbent, fraught with problems like the coronavirus pandemic and a stagnant economy, have changed the way Americans view it.
And what was once a novel political approach - openly airing the grievances that politicians have long tried to fan only tacitly - now seems a tiring act to many observers.
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The strong contrast between Trump and Biden that showed the duel of forums
Four years ago - and particularly as he worked to regain voters after the Access Hollywood scandal - Trump criticized issues like immigration and trade that he said were unfairly benefiting the elite to deter blue-collar Americans.
Its focus and message were narrowed as the campaign drew to a close.
Now, he has criticized the misdeeds of the "deep state" that he claims weigh on his presidency and justify an extension of his mandate.
He complains extensively about what the interviewers have asked him and the tone in which they have asked him.
And he repeatedly insists that he has given up millions of dollars in income serving as president.
In the Oval Office sessions over the past week, Trump insisted that what brought him victory in 2016 will work again, a person briefed on the sessions said.
His refusal to adjust to a completely different political reality has caused frustrations among Republicans, who fear that his deep unpopularity could doom not only his presidency but also Republican control of the Senate.
Advisers have worked in vain to step in and refine a message more appropriate for a sitting president than an outside troublemaker, even in recent days, as polls continue to show him losing ground among voters that he won four years ago.
At times, Trump has taken the directive literally, appealing directly to "suburban women" in his campaign speeches.
At other times he has expressed the electoral calculation of his campaign as fresh from a political report.
"You know what?
We won Wisconsin, we won the whole game, ”he said Saturday night as the temperature dropped in Janesville.
What the hell do you think I'm doing here on a frosty night with 8 degree (Celsius) wind?
Do you think I'm doing this for my health? "
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