FoolishFool

It's primarily an ego thing.

If Trump wins again now in a rematch and gets a 2nd non-consecutive term while their guy dies forever remembered as a 1 term loser (Let's be real: Biden's body, mind or both ain't making it to 2028), that's arguably more humiliating than if Trump had just won 2 times in a row, and they know it.

In case the gif doesn't work

He was ashamed of his persiflage, his boasting, his pretensions of courage and ruthlessness; he was sorry about his cold-bloodedness, his dispassion, his inability to express what he now believed was the case- that he truly regretted killing Jesse and James, that he missed them as much as anybody and wished their murder hadn't been necessary.

Even as he circulated his gym he knew that the smiles disappeared when he passed by. He received so many menacing emails that he could read them without any reaction except curiosity.

He kept to his mom's house all day, flipping over Pokemon cards, looking at his destiny in every Kingler and Muk.

Meowth came up from Viridian at 1pm on the 8th. He had no grand scheme. No strategy. No agreement with higher authorities. Nothing but a vague longing for glory, and a generalized wish for revenge against Ash Ketchum.

Meowth would be ordered to serve a life sentence in the Kanto Penitentiary for second degree murder. Over seven thousand signatures would eventually be gathered in a petition asking for Meowth's release, and in 2002, Professor Oak would pardon the cat.

There would be no eulogies for Ash, no photographs of his body would be sold in Pokemon Centers, no people would crowd the streets in the rain to see his funeral cortege, no Pokedex entries would be written about him, no Pokemon named after him, no one would ever pay twenty-five Pokemon Dollars to stand in the rooms he grew up in.

The shotgun would ignite, and Misty would scream, but Ash Ketchum would only lay on the floor and look at the ceiling, the light going out of his eyes before he could find the right words.