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@claremal-one
How President Trump Could Still Win Re-Election
In this episode of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew considers how President Trump might pull off a reelection and how the 2020 race is going in the Sun Belt states.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/2Ij7uxP via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
Politics Podcast: The Road To A Senate Majority Runs Through The Sun Belt
By Galen Druke, Nate Silver, Clare Malone and Perry Bacon Jr., Galen Druke, Nate Silver, Clare Malone and Perry Bacon Jr., Galen Druke, Nate Silver, Clare Malone and Perry Bacon Jr. and Galen Druke, Nate Silver, Clare Malone and Perry Bacon Jr.
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After Hillary Clinton’s loss in 2016, it was an open question whether Democrats’ path back to the White House would rely on flipping increasingly purple Sun Belt states or winning back old “blue wall” states in the Rust Belt. Based on the current polling, it appears Biden is performing better in the upper Midwest than in the South, but if Democrats are to win control of the Senate they’ll have to perform well in places like Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina as well.
In this installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew discusses the state of the Senate and presidential races in the Sun Belt. They also consider scenarios in which President Trump could beat his declining odds and win a second term.
You can listen to the episode by clicking the “play” button in the audio player above or by downloading it in iTunes, the ESPN App or your favorite podcast platform. If you are new to podcasts, learn how to listen.
The FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast is recorded Mondays and Thursdays. Help new listeners discover the show by leaving us a rating and review on iTunes. Have a comment, question or suggestion for “good polling vs. bad polling”? Get in touch by email, on Twitter or in the comments.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/3j14d3b via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
A Contested 2020 Election Would Be Way Worse Than Bush v. Gore
It’s Wednesday, Nov. 4, and the vote count is too close to call. Neither President Trump nor former Vice President Joe Biden is conceding defeat, recounts are being conducted, disputes over recounts are being lodged, and a court case will soon be making its way to the Supreme Court of the United States. Trump has voiced his belief that there is widespread ballot fraud and as a result there’s already some degree of civil unrest.
This is the nightmare scenario for 2020, one in which a disputed election drives the country further apart. It’s also one that’s vaguely familiar. In 2000, there was no clear winner in the contest between Democrat Al Gore and Republican George W. Bush. That triggered a recount and a controversial Supreme Court decision that ultimately determined the presidency for Bush. Yet even in the direct aftermath of Bush v. Gore, Americans still kept the faith in democratic institutions and the process. I went looking for lessons from that period of disruption. But all I found were the first cancer cells that have metastasized in our political system over the past 20 years.
It’s not that Americans didn’t think something had gone wrong in 2000 — in a CBS News poll conducted after the Supreme Court’s decision in mid-December, 60 percent of people said there had not been a fair and accurate count of votes. Still, 59 percent of people in an ABC News/Washington Post poll from the same time said their opinion of the court remained unchanged. The same poll asked what people would think if there were an unofficial recount and Gore were declared the winner. Would they consider Bush legitimately elected? Eighty-four percent answered, “Yes.”
It’s difficult to imagine similar sentiments in December 2020 if the Supreme Court intervened. Already, Americans say they are worried about something going wrong. In a late September Monmouth University poll, 39 percent of people said they were “not too confident” or “not at all confident” that the 2020 election would be conducted “fairly and accurately.” A FiveThirtyEight/Ipsos poll from about the same time found that while 60 percent of people surveyed said the election would be fair, 39 percent said it wouldn’t be. The open seat on the Supreme Court has only complicated matters.
Journalists’ recitation of engrained partisanship is now somewhat rote, but the scale of our almost-religious alienation from one another is sort of breathtaking; we were not this divided a nation in 2000. Pew Research tracked partisanship trends in America from 1994 to 2017 by measuring responses to the same questions about things like views on gay marriage and immigration. In 1999, there was a 15-point difference between Democrats and Republicans on these questions. In 2017, the difference was 36 points.
But man, did we think we had it bad back in the 15-point difference world.
The history of the 2000 election recount generally tells about the partisan spin that polluted the airwaves during the counting of the ballots. (If you are too young to know what a “hanging chad” is, please Google; it was important in American life for a few weeks, but I just don’t have the strength to get into it here.) Gore’s team wanted officials to recount ballots by hand in four heavily Democratic counties where the vote was quite close, while Bush’s team wanted to stop the recount entirely.
James Baker was Bush’s point-man in Florida, having served as George H.W. Bush’s secretary of state, and was quick to realize that the campaign would need to wage a war for public opinion. “We’re getting killed on ‘count all the votes.’ Who the hell could be against that?” Jeffrey Toobin quoted Baker as saying in his book about the recount, “Too Close to Call.” Gore’s team thought it had the “moral authority to make his case,” according to a New York Times report from two days after Election Day. It allowed “Democrats to suggest that the Republicans are trying to subvert the will of the people.”
As the drama unfolded, many Americans thought more votes needed to be tallied, but they also thought Gore should concede defeat. In a Fox News survey from late November, the plurality of people, 47 percent, thought that not all the votes in Florida had been counted. But the same survey also found that 56 percent of people thought Gore should concede.
This psychology is fascinating when seen through 2020’s rearview mirror. It speaks to a certain satisfaction some people had with the general political state of things: Either Bush or Gore would do just fine. It’s the sort of laissez-faire attitude toward election outcomes that 15-point partisan differences buy you. In the 36-point era, we’re discussing all-out civil war if things are too close to call on election night.
We have accelerated the formation of our separate partisan worlds over the past four years. These worlds accept different realities. Democrats generally accept fact-based conclusions (alongside their partisan, subjective beliefs), and Republicans — or at least the Republican Party — generally eschew the conclusions of experts on things like climate change and COVID-19 (alongside their partisan, subjective beliefs). Given all this, doesn’t it necessarily follow that we would continue down this garden path of separate realities when it comes to an initially indeterminate election outcome? One version of reality accepts a President Biden while the other accepts a President Trump, each with baroque arguments — about the eligibility of certain ballots or the legitimacy of the Electoral College — nicely retrofitted to match a predetermined conclusion.
In a piece in the 2010 collection “The Presidency of George W. Bush: A First Historical Assessment,” David Greenberg, a professor of journalism and media studies at Rutgers University, traced this inability to accept a common reality to the 2000 election and the postmodern brilliance of Baker and company: “The Bush team didn’t just contend that a recount would fail to identify the true winner more accurately; more radically, they argued that any accurate tally was unattainable — that the truth was unknowable.”
Greenberg points to a famous quote given to the New York Times Magazine by a Bush aide for further proof of the roots of this kind of thinking:
The aide said that guys like me were “in what we call the reality-based community,” which he defined as people who “believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.” I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. “That’s not the way the world really works anymore,” he continued. “We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality — judiciously, as you will — we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”
Professionally, I’m a member of the reality-based community. I try to think empirically about America, her culture, people and oh-so-screwy politics. That’s been a challenge as Trump and the Republican Party have perfected the creation of one’s own reality and the belittling of the reality-based community. During the first debate, the president waffled on whether he would concede defeat, falling back on his go-to line about the fraudulent — and unfounded — dangers of mail voting. If he actually does this post-Election Day, media organizations will be forced to grapple with reporting on the news of the day — the president’s words — and battling misinformation and mistrust. It’s more than the press had to contend with in 2000, and it’s an unwinnable scenario. But it’s the reality of our 36-point world.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/2SC5qD6 via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
The Vice Presidential Debate Was Civil. But Did It Shake Up The Race?
In this episode of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew reacts to the first and only vice presidential debate.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/2GQtMWV via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
What We Actually Know About The President’s Health
In this episode of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew discusses the president’s COVID-19 prognosis with two guests. First, they speak with Dr. Craig Spencer of Columbia University about President Trump’s current health and ability to get back to work and campaigning. The crew also speaks with Lara Brown, a professor of political science at George Washington University, about how past administrations have addressed presidential illnesses.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/34w75jj via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
Politics Podcast: How The President’s Health Could Shape The Rest Of The Campaign
By Galen Druke, Clare Malone and Perry Bacon Jr., Galen Druke, Clare Malone and Perry Bacon Jr. and Galen Druke, Clare Malone and Perry Bacon Jr.
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In the four days since President Trump was diagnosed with COVID-19, the public has received limited and conflicting information about his health. To make sense of the patchy details we do have, the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast crew spoke with emergency room doctor Craig Spencer about Trump’s prognosis and ability to get back to work and campaigning. They also talked to presidential scholar Lara Brown about past presidents and how their illnesses have been addressed.
You can listen to the episode by clicking the “play” button in the audio player above or by downloading it in iTunes, the ESPN App or your favorite podcast platform. If you are new to podcasts, learn how to listen.
The FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast is recorded Mondays and Thursdays. Help new listeners discover the show by leaving us a rating and review on iTunes. Have a comment, question or suggestion for “good polling vs. bad polling”? Get in touch by email, on Twitter or in the comments.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/3cZPMeh via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
The Debate Was One Of The Few Opportunities For Trump To Shake Up The Race. He Probably Didn’t.
In this episode of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew reacts to the first 2020 presidential debate.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/3ihDJdd via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
Politics Podcast: Trump Interrupts To Point Of Chaos In First Debate
By Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Nate Silver and Micah Cohen, Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Nate Silver and Micah Cohen, Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Nate Silver and Micah Cohen and Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Nate Silver and Micah Cohen
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In a late night installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew unpacks a chaotic first 2020 presidential debate. It was one of the President Trump’s few remaining opportunities to shake up the dynamics of the race, but his aggressive interruptions likely didn’t help him.
You can listen to the episode by clicking the “play” button in the audio player above or by downloading it in iTunes, the ESPN App or your favorite podcast platform. If you are new to podcasts, learn how to listen.
The FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast is recorded Mondays and Thursdays. Help new listeners discover the show by leaving us a rating and review on iTunes. Have a comment, question or suggestion for “good polling vs. bad polling”? Get in touch by email, on Twitter or in the comments.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/30lYiPq via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
How Far Could Trump Go To Undermine The Election Results?
In this emergency episode of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew reacts to the news that President Trump refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power should he lose the 2020 election.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/3kMlZs1 via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
Politics Podcast: Trump Refuses To Commit To A Peaceful Transfer Of Power
By Galen Druke, Perry Bacon Jr., Clare Malone and Nate Silver, Galen Druke, Perry Bacon Jr., Clare Malone and Nate Silver, Galen Druke, Perry Bacon Jr., Clare Malone and Nate Silver and Galen Druke, Perry Bacon Jr., Clare Malone and Nate Silver
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When asked on Wednesday, President Trump refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power should he lose in November. In this emergency installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew discusses ways that Trump could subvert the results of the election and how his rhetoric affects American democracy.
You can listen to the episode by clicking the “play” button in the audio player above or by downloading it in iTunes, the ESPN App or your favorite podcast platform. If you are new to podcasts, learn how to listen.
The FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast is recorded Mondays and Thursdays. Help new listeners discover the show by leaving us a rating and review on iTunes. Have a comment, question or suggestion for “good polling vs. bad polling”? Get in touch by email, on Twitter or in the comments.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/32YUIMN via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
Arizona Is The Democrats’ Purple Splotch In The Sunbelt
Is Barry Goldwater spinning in his grave? Is Arizona turning blue in 2020?
By every polling indication, the answer is yes. The latest ream of surveys coming out of the state show President Trump trailing Democratic nominee Joe Biden. The FiveThirtyEight polling average of Arizona has shown Biden with a lead of anywhere from 4.5 to 5 percentage points during the month of September, and our forecast gives Biden a 65 percent chance1 of winning the state.
Arizona’s blue-ish tint has not been the norm. The last time the state voted for a Democrat for president was in 1996. Before that, Arizona had a streak of voting for Republicans that dated back to 1952. But while Trump won the state with 48.1 percent of the vote in 2016, his was the narrowest margin of Republican victory in recent memory. Mitt Romney won Arizona with 54.2 percent of the vote in 2012 and John McCain won it (his home state) by around the same in 2008. George W. Bush got 55 percent of the vote in 2004.
But now Arizona is probably a bona fide swing state. That might be difficult to conceive at first — Goldwater, “maverick” McCain, and the latter-day celebrity of Sheriff Joe Arpaio have solidified the state as the convervative cowboy of American pop culture. But a combination of long-term demographic changes and the, uh, unusual nature of the 2020 election, have revealed the state for what it is: a purple splotch in the desert.
That’s in part because of Latino voters, who are a rapidly growing group in Arizona and promise to play a larger role in the 2020 election than in previous years. According to Pew Research Center projections, for the first time Latinos will be the largest minority group participating in the 2020 election, with 32 million Latinos eligible to vote. Arizona has among the largest Latino populations in the country — 31.7 percent of the state’s population is Latino, according to 2019 American Community Survey estimates, up from 25.2 percent in the year 2000 — and the group’s participation in elections appears to be growing. Exit polls from the 2008 presidential election showed Latino voters as 16 percent of Arizona’s electorate, and an independent analysis of the state’s electorate in 2016 showed that about 21 percent was Latino. In 2018, exit polls showed that 18 percent of Arizona voters were Latino in a year that gave Democrat Kyrsten Sinema the victory in a close Senate Race.
While the Latino vote isn’t a monolith, there are factors that tend to make Arizona’s Latinos more Democratic-leaning. For one thing, the majority of Latinos in Arizona are of Mexican descent, a group that has leaned more Democratic than, say, Cuban Americans. According to data from Equis Research, compared to more Republican-leaning Texas, there’s a higher rate of foreign-born Latinos in Arizona, and they tend to be more anti-Trump. A higher share of Arizona’s Latinos live in more urban areas compared to Texas’s Latinos, another factor that skews their vote more Democratic.
In addition to the population growth of Latinos in Arizona, Democrats say that they’ve also worked to leverage their advantage with the community. “We’ve created an electorate,” Democratic strategist Rodd McLeod said of the party and community groups. He pointed to Arizona’s Permanent Early Voting List — even before the pandemic, about 80 percent of the state voted by mail — as one key to building out the Democratic coalition in the state. Identifying people who are “on the edge of voting or not voting,” McLeod said, helped push out reminders and door-knockers to voters who might not be in the habit of regularly casting a ballot, like some Latino voters.
But ongoing demographic shifts are not the only reason that Arizona is competitive in the 2020 race. White voters are also leaning towards Biden, marking a change from 2016 when Trump won 54 percent of Arizona’s white voters, according to exit polls. Current polls show a much closer race between Biden and Trump with that group: a recent New York Times/Siena College survey, for example, showed Trump leading Biden by only a percentage point with white voters overall in the state. Among white voters with a college degree, Biden was beating Trump by 15 percentage points — Trump won that group in Arizona in 2016, by a margin of 6 points, according to the exit polls.
Trump’s problem with suburban white voters is magnified in Arizona, where many of the state’s votes lie in the dense suburbia that is Maricopa County. What’s more, those white, suburban independents in Arizona are more likely to be over 65 than elsewhere in the country, a group that Trump is struggling with. Arizona has the 12th-highest share of Americans over the age of 65, according to a 2018 analysis by the Population Reference Bureau.
Mike Noble, chief pollster at Arizona-based OH Predictive Insights told me that Republicans’ trouble in the suburbs could be traced back to 2018 in the Martha McSally-Kyrsten Sinema Senate race. When he looked at precincts that flipped their party loyalty from 2016 to 2018, Noble told me, McSally, the Republican candidate, was on the losing side of things: Over 80 districts in suburban Maricopa County that voted for Trump had switched over to vote for Sinema. “The composition of the folks there is white, college educated, independents, self-identified moderates,” Noble said. In the Trump era, he said, independents in the state who had once leaned to the right were now leaning left. Voters are more preoccupied these days with health care, the economy and education, according to Noble’s data. That’s a reversal from last year, he said, when Arizona voters saw immigration as a top issue.
“I would say actually, Arizona is a very much an independent state,” he said. “If anyone has ever run to the far left or far right, they’ve gotten walloped.”
At least that’s the case in recent history. Before that, Barry Goldwater had some things to say.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/3hWlCJt via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
The Potential Pitfalls In Rushing To Confirm A New Supreme Court Justice
In this installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew discusses the political calculations for both Republicans and Democrats over how to proceed in replacing Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/3mJ9i32 via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
Politics Podcast: What Comes Next In The Fight To Fill Ginsburg’s Seat
By Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Perry Bacon Jr., Nate Silver and Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux, Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Perry Bacon Jr., Nate Silver and Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux, Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Perry Bacon Jr., Nate Silver and Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux, Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Perry Bacon Jr., Nate Silver and Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux and Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Perry Bacon Jr., Nate Silver and Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux
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So far, two Republican Senators — Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski — have announced their opposition to filling the Supreme Court seat that once belonged to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg prior to the 2020 election. In this installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew discusses the political calculations for both Republicans and Democrats over how to proceed in replacing Ginsburg. They also look at the dynamics at play in the key Senate races of Maine, Iowa and Arizona.
You can listen to the episode by clicking the “play” button in the audio player above or by downloading it in iTunes, the ESPN App or your favorite podcast platform. If you are new to podcasts, learn how to listen.
The FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast is recorded Mondays and Thursdays. Help new listeners discover the show by leaving us a rating and review on iTunes. Have a comment, question or suggestion for “good polling vs. bad polling”? Get in touch by email, on Twitter or in the comments.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/3kBfY17 via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
Why Some Latino Voters Are Backing Trump
In this week’s FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew talks to pollster Carlos Odio, the co-founder of Equis Research, about political trends among Latino voters. They also discuss whether polls in the Midwest have corrected their biases and whether scandals still matter.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/3ccfHPz via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
Politics Podcast: Trump Is Narrowing The Gap With Latino Voters
By Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Perry Bacon Jr. and Nate Silver, Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Perry Bacon Jr. and Nate Silver, Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Perry Bacon Jr. and Nate Silver and Galen Druke, Clare Malone, Perry Bacon Jr. and Nate Silver
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Recent polling shows that President Trump is improving his standing among Latino voters in the presidential race, particularly in Florida. In this installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew talks to pollster Carlos Odio about political trends among Latinos. They also discuss whether polls in the Midwest could be biased against Republicans (as they were in 2016) and whether scandals still matter.
You can listen to the episode by clicking the “play” button in the audio player above or by downloading it in iTunes, the ESPN App or your favorite podcast platform. If you are new to podcasts, learn how to listen.
The FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast is recorded Mondays and Thursdays. Help new listeners discover the show by leaving us a rating and review on iTunes. Have a comment, question or suggestion for “good polling vs. bad polling”? Get in touch by email, on Twitter or in the comments.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/33sUbll via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
Why Trump Might Be Scaring Off Older Voters
“Most of the activities you normally have here in adult Disney World are closed down,” Bryan Casey told me recently by phone from The Villages, Florida, one of the country’s largest retirement communities. COVID-19 has dulled the normally vibrant social lives of Villages residents, who typically spend their days on eternal summer vacation. The town squares that anchor the sprawling development, usually filled with drinking and dancing and music, have been shut down. “Open The Squares? Look At What Is Happening At The Colleges,” read the headline on a recent letter to the editor at Villages News.
In Sumter County, where The Villages is situated, Donald Trump won 68.3 percent of the vote in 2016, and no other county in Florida had a higher turnout. But, Casey — the communications director of the Villages Democratic Club — said, “I have a couple of friends I know who voted for Trump in 2016 who say that they won’t do that this time.” But few would be willing to admit that publicly. “You’ve got to live here to understand that,” he said.
If that’s the case, Casey’s friends wouldn’t be alone. The pandemic has killed some 190,000 Americans, and 8 in 10 of the deaths reported have been among those 65 or over. President Trump’s delayed and fractured response to the outbreak appears to have reshaped the political dynamics for older Americans. Four years ago, he won voters 65 or over by a margin of 13.3 percentage points. But looking at an average of the nine most recent national polls, voters age 65 or over1 favored Biden to Trump by 49.5 percent to 45.7 percent.
Who are the older voters abandoning Trump? A look at the polls from 2016 to 2020 shows movement mostly among white voters. But why are they increasingly abandoning him? There’s the pandemic, of course, but I’m not sure that explains everything. An average of six national polls from May — before the beginning of widespread protests against police violence that would come to dominate the news over the summer — showed Trump and Biden tied among voters 65 or over. Perhaps this other national crisis is driving away older Americans. Trump’s inflammatory rhetoric about race and crime could be alienating them as well.
The Villages is perhaps best known, of late, for a viral video of a pro-Trump golf-cart parade (these parades are among the primary modes of political expression in The Villages, since golf carts abound and lawn signs are prohibited). In the clip, first retweeted by the president and later deleted by him, a Trump supporter can be heard shouting “white power” at a group of counterprotesters.
Despite these provocative pro-Trump images coming out of Florida, the shift toward Biden is evident in the state, a key to winning the Electoral College. A late August Quinnipiac University poll in Florida showed Biden leading Trump among older voters, by 54 percent to 44 percent and another late August poll of Florida voters, this one by Public Policy Polling, showed Biden in the lead among the same group,2 by 52 percent to 47 percent. This stands in contrast to the sentiments of older Florida voters at around this time four years ago. An early September 2016 CBS News poll found Trump leading Hillary Clinton by 8 points among Florida voters age 65 or over, while a CNN/ORC International poll found him with an even bigger, 15-point, lead. And sure enough, on Election Day 2016, exit polls indicated that Trump won this demographic group in Florida by 57 percent to Clinton’s 40 percent.
I asked Jerry Prince, the president of the Villages Republican Club, what he made of the trend away from Trump among older voters. “I think it is false and propaganda by the media and Democrats,” he wrote in an email. “The seniors here have worked hard, retired and remember what Law and Order is and know that what is happening in America today is being denied and pushed by the Democrats. Again, I think this is false and without some true numbers I will continue to believe it is false.”
A recent Quinnipiac University poll conducted following the RNC — an event with the discernible theme that “violence in the largely Black cities of America makes everyone, including white suburbanites, unsafe” — showed Biden leading by 10 points overall. Voters age 65 or over said they supported Biden over Trump by 50 percent to 46 percent, and when asked if Trump made them feel “more safe” or “less safe,” 46 percent said that Trump made them feel less safe; 44 percent said the opposite.
In attempting to speak what he thinks is the language of an older generation of white Americans — racially tinged talk about the destruction of the suburbs, for instance — Trump might actually be shooting himself in the foot. Even as white Americans’ support for the Black Lives Matter movement has waned over the course of the summer, this doesn’t appear to have had a significant effect on Biden’s lead. Voters seem to separate him from the movement even as Trump has tried to tie it to him. (My colleague Perry Bacon Jr. took a deeper look at this issue last month.)
Older white suburbanites, the sort with culturally conservative values who might look askance at the present-day Democratic party, also matured in an America that harshly stigmatized overt racism. These voters might share Trump’s views on race but be turned off by the way he expresses them. Ronald Reagan, the original Republican disrupter of the political status quo, was good at talking to these voters. He’s famous for popularizing the racist trope of the “welfare queen,” for instance, a way to talk about Black Americans in cities under the guise of people abusing a government benefit. His administration’s public-health stance of “just say no” to drugs was largely geared toward suburban voters, a softer way to talk about substance abuse, while the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 promoted harsher mandatory minimum sentences for possession of crack, a drug largely associated with Black inner-city populations, compared with the punishments for possession of powder cocaine.
Trump’s rhetoric focused on the suburban American idyll might, ironically, be making the people living that dream even more nervous in these nerve-wracking times. He might have been better off sticking with the pandemic — cases appear to be flattening out ever so slightly, though thousands of new cases are reported daily — than with the red meat of racial politics.
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/3hdgsbH via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR
States That Are Not Normally Competitive Are Competitive In 2020
In this week’s FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew discuss which states could be competitive in the 2020 election. And we bring you another segment of “good use or bad use of polling?”
from Clare Malone – FiveThirtyEight https://ift.tt/339HqvW via https://ift.tt/1B8lJZR