The good thing here is that Trump can't win. If he ends up as the Republican candidate, then he doesn't get ANY independent voters, who are the only reason we have had presidents from both parties. If Bernie is the Democratic candidate, then Bloomberg runs and most likely gets quite a few Republican voters because he's not Trump. Honestly, in a Trump vs. Sanders race, Bloomberg wins. All of Clinton's supporters would immediately switch to him, and a bunch of Republicans would as well. In a Trump vs. Clinton race, independents choose Clinton and she wins.
So in other words, we either get another old, moderate white guy as President, or we get to have our first female president. Too bad there would never be another one, because the US would presumably erupt in Civil War because Hillary seems to think that it's perfectly logical to just confiscate firearms despite the fact that they're ingrained in America culture and also protected by the constitution. Then again, maybe Hillary will just be generally incompetent instead of Civil War-level divisive. Because we all know damn well that at least half of what she says is just taken out of the latest Democratic opinion poll.
You seem to be making the assumption that independents occupy the middle of the political spectrum, perched precariously between the Republicans on one side and the Democrats on the other. That isn't true. Independents are independent not because they are moderates, but because neither of the two major parties in U.S. politics appeal to them.
Independents can be extremists. Segregationists and people calling for the U.S. government to employ nuclear weapons against Pyongyang will likely consider the GOP too far to the left for them. Communists of all stripes, and folks advocating for the U.S. to dismantle its nuclear arsenal entirely, will likely consider the Democrats (especially Hillary) to be as good as right-wing extremists. They are as far from the middle ground as possible, but are all independents.
Aside from the occupiers of the extremes, you also have independents with esoteric beliefs, neither right nor left but definitely not mainstream. Protectionists are still a relatively visible dempgraphic, both in left and right wing circles. Circling back to the topic of discussion, Trump has laid down some heavy rhetoric to the goal of pursuing that group in particular.
Appealing to the centre is not the same as appealing to independent voters.
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