Data journalist G. Elliott Morris with election analyst David Nir on a recent podcast.
Among the things they discussed:
The effect of Donald Trump's unpopularity on downballot races.
How Trump's attempt to gerrymander the US House in some states will likely be a net loss for the GOP. The word dummymander was used in this part of the convo.
Why the Democrats should make ICE a prominent issue in the midterms.
PLUS: General nerd talk about polling and interpreting poll numbers. After hearing this podcast, you may start using expressions like "margin bro".
David Nir does a breakdown of states which are changing their congressional boundaries for this year's midterms. This series of events began with the Trump-inspired remap in Texas which was designed to eliminate 5 Democratic seats. There is now a high likelihood that the final result of all the gerrymander wars will be no net change or even a slight gain for Dems. The Stable Genius fails again. 🤣
In her NY Times column, Michelle Goldberg adds to Elliott's and David's comments on how ICE has become a monster – and therefore a vote loser for Trump.
But while we also need immigration enforcement, we do not need ICE, an agency that has existed for only 22 years, and that increasingly resembles a fascist paramilitary. Thanks to Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill, ICE now has a budget larger than most countries’ militaries. A majority of its work force has been hired in the last year, many as part of an explicitly white nationalist recruiting campaign. It is surveilling not just undocumented immigrants but American citizens.
ICE has turned into an organization of state-sponsored Trump Brown Shirts – paid for with tons of our tax dollars. A complete reorganization of the Department of Homeland Security with the replacement of ICE by normal professionals is not just a reasonable proposal but a necessary return to sanity.
