if Arnie hadnt been governor would this have been a sequel?

seems strange to do a remake when TR couldve had a 20y later sequel.. maybe they shouldve held off a year or two until Arnold finished his term, kept the director (although ideally Verhovan again) and some of the cast (and maybe brought back Sharon Stone) and rejigged it into a sequel (or dusted off the sequel script that was going to go ahead in the late 90s with Commander Riker directing, although i guess that became Minority Report but there was probably other sequel scripts around -https://moviechat.org/tt0100802/Total-Recall/5f00936473ea741018ad93b7/recalling-the-lost-TR-sequel)

then again back in 2012 maybe it wasnt really the usual thing to do long belated sequels to franchises..(especially a 'lone' film that was not already a series) instead it was still sort of the reboot era (Batman, Bond, and Star Trek and Terminator to a degree) Star Wars 7/Jurassic World really changed all that

i guess those reasons apply for why Conan was rebooted instead of doing King Conan with Arnie