Sure, Donald Trump is unfit. Sure, Trump may have begged yet another country—China—to help him win reelection. Sure, Trump is emotionally damaged and intellectually addled, according to a written account by his former national security adviser John Bolton.
But does that matter to the Senate Republicans who cosigned Trump's presidency by saving him from conviction without hearing from a single witness? Are you high? No effing way do they have the integrity required for a little self-examination, according to CNN reporting. They're in the tank for Trump—always have been, always will be, no matter what.
Asked whether Senate Republicans should have sought to secure Bolton's testimony now that his book is out, the ever-reflective Sen. Ron Johnson responded, "No," adding, "We never should have had an impeachment trial."
Of course, that's not what Bolton said. Based on Trump's persistent pattern of placing his own personal and electoral needs over duty to the country, Bolton said Trump should have been investigated and impeached for more, not less. Trump engaged in "obstruction of justice as a way of life," as Bolton said, referring to his interventions in criminal investigations for personal favors.
Still, Sen. Cory Gardner of Colorado, who's likely one of the top two most-endangered GOP senators seeking reelection, had the nerve to speak up and blame House Democrats for not taking Bolton to court over this unwillingness to testify. "The House didn't think it was important," Sen. Gardner quipped. What a weasel. Bolton, who's no hero, did publicly express his willingness to testify in front of the GOP-led Senate—the Republican caucus just refused to hear from him, or any other witnesses for that matter.
The sole Republican senator to express regret about not hearing from Bolton also voted in favor of having witnesses at the trial. “I wish we had a trial with the people testifying under oath,” Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah told reporters.
But most Republicans did the only logical thing one could do in the face of a 500-page manuscript documenting the myriad ways in which Trump is selling out and endangering the country: They refused to comment.
Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming, however, really went the extra mile, affirming that he's more convinced than ever that Trump's the right guy for the job despite begging China to buy more agricultural products in order to secure his reelection. "Different people use different sales techniques," Barrasso offered. Whether they’re legal or not apparently isn’t relevant. "Every president has, one way or another, thought they ought to be reelected. I think President Trump should be reelected. I support his reelection, I'm for it."
Do Republicans even know the Constitution exists? They are proving themselves more useless by the day, and have no business stewarding the country.
I read a poll of polls recently. It disclosed that approximately 80% of Joe Biden supporters were willing to communicate that to someone calling to ask who they would rather see elected President. In contrast, only 29% of Trump supporters would reveal their preference.
If that is accurate, then the Biden numbers are correct and he’s likely topped out in his support.
But the Trump support is likely much higher than is being reported.
Why shouldn’t election polls be corrupt? Everything else the Left touches has been. Polls used to be taken to take a snapshot in time of the public’s pulse on an issue or candidate. They are now used to shape public opinion. In Trump Derangement Syndrome terms, they are used to deflate us into thinking there’s no chance he can win, so just stay home and don’t vote.
We learned this lesson the last time, and we remember why it’s so important to elect Trump to at least stave off disaster for another four years. I know it means four more years of impeachment theater, but it’s worth it.
WHY ARE THE POLLS FAVORING BIDEN THIS TIME?
The reason the large polling outfits continue to show Biden with a significant lead, besides tweaking Trump’s nose, is to set the table for further unrest when Trump does win reelection.
Just like after Trump’s win in 2020, The Left, including the DNC and the HRC campaign, immediately went into a street-battle mode. Leftist operatives held violent street protests, riots actually, and attacked Trump supporters where they could find them.
Trump’s reelection will trigger these anti-American fools like never before. Maybe Nancy Pelosi (RIP!!) will have a stroke.
THE POLITICAL POLLING INDUSTRY IS DEAD
Pollsters have been so cynical and possessed of liberal biases since the first Clinton administration that no serious conservative voters take them seriously or even pay attention to them anymore. There is substantial evidence that many, if not most, people who answer pollster’s questions actively lie about their political stance and their intentions on election day.
The ONLY poll that matters any longer is the one which is taken on election day.
Polls. Are. Bunk. Period. Rigged sampling, statistical manipulation, biased reporting, pre-conceived conclusions, formulated results, all combine to make them meaningless except as headline generators and propaganda tools. Voter turnout and legitimate voting practices determine elections, not polls.
Only cattle and sheep follow the herd.
SHOULD WE BE WORRIED?
I am a Trump supporter and hope he wins reelection, but I still have to ask the question: so what if he does? He is a tremendous fighter, but at best he is breaking even? What do we do post-Trump? There is no other conservative candidate that can fight the battle he has been fighting.
I keep saying this, but I don’t think anyone is listening. The Democrats have no opposition. No one is plotting strategies to counter their strategy.
We are forced to vote Republican because the alternative is even worse, but they will not fight for us. Sure they will vote umpteen times to repeal Obamacare when it is a certainty that it won’t pass, but gosh darn it, they were just one vote shy from getting it done when they held all three branches of government.
We need to revive the Tea Party or something — we got no men on the field.
I don’t like the idea of political dynasties either but, I also don’t think Donald Trump, Jr. should be penalized for his genes if he has that “fire down below.” Maybe if he was VP for a few years, we could see whether that fire was another inferno, like his father, or only a smoldering ember. After all, he has been pretty much sheltered most of his life.
In early February, all but one Republican senator outright voted to acquit Donald Trump of impeachment charges without so much as hearing from one single witness. But judging by Senate Republican campaign ads four months later, you'd be forgiven if you thought Trump had been convicted and booted from office.
In 15 campaign ads released since March by Senate Republicans in competitive races, pictures of Trump were nowhere to be found in any of them, according to a review by the Daily Beast. Trump managed to get a single mention in a late April ad by North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis bragging that the senator had been appointed to the now irrelevant White House coronavirus task force. That ad has likely already been benched since Trump's all but tweeted “uncle” at the virus.
Tillis, who has voted with Trump more than 93% of the time, has gone through quite the transformation in the last several months. When Senate Republicans voted to save Trump's presidency, Tillis released a Trump-centric ad defending that vote, touting Trump's trade deals, and reminding voters that Trump would indeed be on the ballot in November. Oops.
In a do-over this week, Tillis sympathizes with the economic difficulties many residents in his state are facing while entirely abandoning Trump and his happy talk about jumpstarting the economy and "TRANSITIONING TO GREATNESS."
A similar erasure of Trump is happening in ads from GOP incumbents in Maine, Arizona, Colorado, and Montana. Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner, who's voted with Trump 89% of the time, skips over Trump completely while hyping his bipartisan work with Democratic Gov. Jared Polis to confront the coronavirus. Maine Sen. Susan Collins appears to have switched parties in one ad featuring her alongside Democratic senators Tim Kaine of Virginia and Joe Manchin of West Virginia.
Looks like GOP senators took to heart that memo released by the National Republican Senatorial Committee advising against defending Trump. None of these senators are trying to defend the indefensible, even after they voted to keep his presidency alive. Instead, many have taken the memo's advice to scapegoat China for Trump's failures at every turn.
Even Arizona Sen. Martha McSally—who has voted with Trump 95% of the time—moved away from ads earlier this year skewering her Democratic challenger for supporting Trump’s impeachment and removal. Now, McSally's busy playing up the business ties of Democrat Mark Kelly, who's trouncing her in the polls, to China.
Sure, Senate Republicans are fundraising off Trump in targeted emails, but they're not touching him with a 10-foot pole in their large-scale ads. Expect to see more of the mysteriously disappearing Trump since more GOP Senate seats are in play by the week, it seems. Trump's simply too toxic to touch—too bad all the Senate Republicans up for reelection this cycle put their personal stamp of approval on Trump with their acquittal votes.
Senate Republicans just can't put out the fires Donald Trump keeps setting fast enough. At first, their effort to maintain their majority in November centered around defending four main seats in Maine, Arizona, Colorado, and North Carolina while hoping for a pickup of Sen. Doug Jones' seat in Alabama.
But Trump's cratering approvals and his spectacularly horrible leadership skills in a crisis just keep sucking more states into play.
For starters, Trump's approvals keep sinking. Gallup just put him at 39% in a poll taken from May 28 to June 4, slipping 10 points from 49% in late March. Notably, only 47% of Americans approve of Trump's handling of the economy according to Gallup's latest survey, which is a steep tumble from 63% approval in January. The economy has always been Trump's strongest issue area.
Bloomberg News reports that Trump huddled with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell Wednesday, the same day Gallup's new poll was released. Neither one of them disclosed their private conversation, but it hardly matters—Republicans are irrevocably tied to Trump at this point. Not only have they simply surrendered like a bunch of lemmings, they built him into the lawless monster he's become and then voted to save his presidency without even fielding a proper impeachment trial.
What that means is that Democrats' pickup opportunities in the Senate just keep expanding beyond those seats held by Sens. Susan Collins, Cory Gardner, Martha McSally, and Thom Tillis. Overall, Republicans are defending 23 Senate seats to just 12 for Democrats. The new states that Democrats are eyeing include Iowa, Montana, and Georgia. Here are some basic data points for each:
Iowa: The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee put $7.3 million into TV/digital ads targeting Sen. Joni Ernst's seat, with two recent polls showing Ernst's Democratic challenger, Theresa Greenfield, up by several points.
Montana: The DSCC also directed $5.2 million to Montana to help Democrat Steve Bullock, the state's current governor, topple incumbent GOP Sen. Steve Daines.
Georgia: No DSCC action here yet, but Cook Political Report recently re-rated incumbent Sen. David Perdue's seat to "Lean R," making it more competitive. Ernst's and Daines' seats are also in the Lean Republican category, as is the seat of the other Georgia GOP senator, Kelly Loeffler.
Other possibilities remain, such as in Kansas, where GOP right-winger Kris Kobach—who lost his 2018 gubernatorial bid—could become the Republican nominee to replace retiring Sen. Pat Roberts.
Republicans are also putting money into defending states beyond the original four. The Senate Leadership Fund, a McConnell-aligned super PAC, reserved $10.1 million in radio/TV space this month in Montana, and Iowa was part of the PAC's $67.1 million ad buy in March. That buy also included Arizona, Colorado, Maine, North Carolina, and Kentucky (McConnell's seat!).
A spokesperson for the National Republican Senatorial Committee made the laughable argument that once more money was spent defining these Democratic challengers, they wouldn't look so hot.
“A lot of these Democrats haven’t had much money spent against them yet and once their records are litigated voter opinion will turn against them,” Jesse Hunt told Bloomberg.
The idea that any of these Democrats' records could be worse than voting to save Trump's presidency just in time for him to screw up a pandemic response and a national reckoning on race is sheer folly. Senate Republicans can spend all the money they want—they will rise and fall with Donald Trump. He is their fate.
Joe Biden suggested the military will intervene should President Trump lose to him in the 2020 election and refuse to leave office.
Biden was asked by Comedy Central’s Trevor Noah whether the thought of Trump refusing to exit the White House had ever entered his mind.
Surprisingly, the former Vice President replied, “Yes, I have.”
He then discussed former military officials who have spoken out against the President’s desire to use the military to help quell riots in Democrat-ravaged cities.
In demonstrating that he has, in fact, been thinking about what to do if Trump refuses to accept the election results, the Democrat nominee somehow linked the two.
“I promise, I am absolutely convinced they [the military] will escort him from the White House with great dispatch,” said Biden.
Joe Biden says that his greatest concern that is that President Trump is going to try to “steal this election” and the military will have to escort him from the White House.
“I promise you I’m absolutely convinced they will escort him from the White House with great dispatch.” pic.twitter.com/MLPhMy2EdW
At another point during the interview, Biden – whose party refused to accept the 2016 election results, tried to remove the President through impeachment, and is currently trying to steal the 2020 election through vote-by-mail – said his biggest worry is that Trump is actually the one who will cheat.
“It’s my greatest concern. My single greatest concern,” Biden said. “This president is going to try to steal this election. This is a guy who said that all mail-in ballots are fraudulent.”
Of course, he never said “all” mail-in voting is fraudulent, only that it is ripe for such activity, which is verifiably true.
Democratic Rep. Cedric Richmond says he agrees with Joe Biden’s claim that the military will escort President Trump out of the White House if he loses the election and refuses his loss: “I do want to be on the escort committee to make sure that (Trump) leaves the White House” pic.twitter.com/gX0C9wVIlM
Four years we’ve spent listening to Democrats refuse to accept the election results. And now we have to sit here and listen to them yet again say they’re worried Trump won’t accept them?
Pot, meet kettle.
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany slammed Biden for his off-the-wall comments.
“Leave it to Democrats to go out there and grandstand and level these conspiracy theories,” McEnany told Fox News, adding that it was “a ridiculous proposition.”
Democrats have spent a good portion of Trump’s first term in office pretending Hillary was the truly legitimate President, so peddling in the ‘ridiculous’ is what they do.
Lindsey Graham, one of Donald Trump’s chief lapdogs in the Senate, will have sweeping subpoena power to try to belatedly exonerate Trump and incriminate the Obama administration in the investigation into Russian election interference in 2016. The Senate Judiciary Committee voted along partisan lines to give Graham, who is the committee chair, that subpoena power while rejecting—also along partisan lines—Democrats’ efforts to get subpoena power as well.
Graham plans to subpoena Obama administration officials including former CIA Director John Brennan, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, and former FBI Director James Comey. All part of the plan to delegitimize the investigation into what Russia did to help Trump win rather than investigating … what Russia did to help Trump win.
“I am very intent in making sure this never happens again,” Graham said. “This” is the investigation into Russian election interference, not the Russian election interference itself.
It’s not just Graham and the Judiciary Committee, either. The Senate Homeland Security Committee, chaired by Ron Johnson, will also be investigating the Russia investigation, and, as an extra-partisan bonus, he’s investigating Hunter Biden, too. Because nothing says “this investigation is aimed at uncovering the truth about a very important issue, not attacking my political opponents” like waiting until years after the fact during an election year and following the lead of a president who was impeached for abusing power to create a scandal around the same figure you’re now “investigating.”
Trump had Park Police and National Guard troops violently clear a peaceful protest so he could get a photo op. His attorney general has lied about it and the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has apologized for being party to it. But Senate Republicans—the same Senate Republicans who protected him during the impeachment trial—couldn’t care less. Neither do they care that a foreign nation attacked U.S. democracy four years ago. They just want to keep the truth from getting out and do whatever it takes to protect Trump from ever facing a consequence for anything.
There’s a nationwide movement against police brutality and a global pandemic that’s killed more than 100,000 Americans, in large part because of Donald Trump’s refusal to admit it might be a problem. And Senate Republicans don’t care about anything but keeping Trump in power.
Senate Democrats are looking like winners in Arizona, Colorado, Maine, and North Carolina. Their leads are so large at this point that it’s hard to see, absent scandal, how they won’t win. Democrats are also looking good in the next tier of races, tied or leading in Iowa, both Georgia seats, and Montana. Kansas and Texas are in the third tier, which is lean or likely Republican, but within the realm of possibility.
And then there are the fourth-tier races—those that are “likely or safe Republican.” While some early polling looks encouraging, it would be really tough for Democrats to pick up absent a massive Democratic wave. And here, I’m mostly talking about challenges in Kentucky and South Carolina, and our incumbent senator in Alabama. And yet, Trump’s national polling collapse threatens Republican holds on these seats even if they remain safely red in the presidential race.
Alabama has been considered a lost cause almost from the moment that Democratic incumbent Doug Jones won the seat in a 2017 special election 50-48.3—a margin of just 22,000 votes—against a child predator, someone who even admitted approaching teenage girls while he was in his 30s. It has seemed inconceivable that Democrats would ever hold that seat during a presidential year in a state that gave Trump a 61-34 victory in 2016.
And certainly Civiqs’ daily tracker of Trump’s job approvals in Alabama shows his job approval rating hovering in the 60-40 range for the last three years. But look what suddenly happened:
That’s a fall from +20 net approvals during impeachment to single digits +9 today, or a net 11-point drop. That outpaces the drops we’ve seen nationally (around a net 5-point drop).
The drop is even bigger in Kentucky, the third most pro-Trump state after Wyoming and West Virginia.
The drop here is actually in line with national results: a 5-point drop from +8 net approvals to +3 (50-47).
Now, Trump will win all three of these states. And he’ll win them all easily. That’s not the point here.
The point is that for Democrats to have any chance, they’ll need ticket splitters or voters who don’t fill the ballot past the presidential contest. The stronger the pro-Trump vote is, the tougher that task becomes.
In 2008, incumbent Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, who is the current Republican leader in the Senate, won his election race 53-47. That same year, on the same ballot, John McCain defeated Barack Obama 57-41. McConnell ran 10 points behind the top of the ticket.
So yeah, if Trump wins Kentucky along the same lines as his 63-33 victory in 2016, then the Democrats won’t defeat McConnell, period. But as we’ve seen in recent polling, Trump’s share of the Biden versus Trump vote is closely correlated to his personal ratings. If Trump’s popularity continues to falter in the state (and the pandemic and job losses aren’t going anywhere any time soon), that presidential race could tighten, and that hill Democrats must climb gets easier and easier. Same goes for Alabama, South Carolina, and pretty much every single other state.
Can Democrats win these three states? If the election were today, they wouldn’t. But given Trump’s inability to show anything akin to leadership in these critical times, the more he falls, the better our chances.
You want to chip in and help? It wouldn’t be a bad idea, so here you go!
I used to think they were employing hyperbole and grasping at any straw at the beginning (2016-17). Still, the past couple of years, they’ve lost all connection to not only reality but also goodness, virtue, and our bedrock American values. They will get what they want, good and hard, and none will have ever deserved it more.
Skin color shouldn’t matter at this time in our country, but there are those (Democrats, Socialists, Communists, Anarchists) who will not let it be a non-issue.
RIGHT IS WRONG, AND UP IS DOWN
Sadly, we live in a time where the unthinkable has become tolerable, where the tolerable has become acceptable, where the acceptable has become legal. We now live in a time where the legally acceptable, barely tolerable, and in some cases, outright unthinkable has become praised. And, in some cases, it has even become mandatory to accept the unthinkable.
The Left’s plan all along has been to destroy our society to turn us into a socialist country for the New World Order. The right’s boogeyman George Soros is extremely vetted in the globalist cause and goes unscathed as he and others destroy lives, homes, businesses, and communities.
If these foolish politicians accept the demands from ANTIFA and Black Lives Matter (BLM) about police, then they will have taken away any obstacle in my way of shooting you when you make the mistake of aggravating me or trying to hurt my family. If you accept these fool’s terms, then they will have no choice but to accept mine and tens of millions like me. With foolish actions goes serious and profound re-actions that will not end up well for the participants like BLM and ANTIFA.
IT’S ALL A CULT, ALL THAT’S MISSING IS THE KOOL-AID
Leftist ideology and indoctrination programmed children for decades in public school systems. That’s why our news media is 95% Leftists. Starting in the 60s with free love, cops are pigs, question authority, etc. when they were all coming of age. All so hip.
“Hey, Hey Ho Ho, Western Civ has got to go.” SDS, the Weather Underground, Black Power. Some of us remember it well. This is not new. It’s supercharged due to the lightening speed of the internet and cell phones.
TRUMP HAS BEEN HAMSTRUNG HIS ENTIRE TERM
He deserves a term that will let him get even more accomplished. It’s a miracle that he has accomplished as much as he has – and anyone who hates him should not be taking advantage of the massive stock market successes that are entirely due to him.
One thing most of us know, GOP Establishment RINOS were always joined at the hip with the Democrat/Marxist party. They just lived in the shadows and dressed in camouflage to fool conservative voters and get elected- over and over- Trump recognized the growing anger and frustration in the country and started a party and movement of his own.- our own.
He has been at war with the Uniparty since he began his unbelievable journey to the White House. They have ALL “resisted” his every attempt to right the wrongs and held the threat of impeachment over his head like a sharp sword. We are slowly ridding ourselves of these RINO traitors even though it takes more time than we would like.
EXPECT A HUGE TRUMP WIN
The country is far more liberal than it was in 1968-72, so we cannot expect a Nixon-like landslide; however, we can expect a clear and convincing win of at least what Obama did to Romney in 2012.
Trump will win every state he did last time but also pick up New Hampshire, Minnesota, Nevada, and Maine AT LEAST.
If the Dems were pragmatic and had any sense, they’d dump Biden and lever in Michael Bloomberg with Amy Klobuchar as his VP to hold Minnesota and those crucial midwest states. Still, they won’t because they are prisoners of their Leftist ideology like victims of a cult in meltdown mode.
No one should count their chickens before they hatch. This is not what I’m doing. What I’m saying is that if we keep doing what we’re doing, and that guy cowering in the bunker in the White House keeps doing what he’s doing, and Senate Republicans keep carrying water for the guy in the bunker … then yeah, Democrats will pick up the Senate. And I’m not going out on a limb in saying so.
The big picture: Republicans currently hold a 53-47 majority in the Senate. Trump is going to lose. Therefore, Democrats need to pick up a net three seats to get to 50 seats, with the vice presidential tiebreaker putting the chamber in Democratic hands.
We are probably going to lose the Senate seat in Alabama. That was a temporary gift won in a special election against a child molester. And we still barely won. In a normal year, against a normal Republican, with Donald Trump at the top of the ticket? If Democratic Sen. Doug Jones wins reelection, we’ve got a 60-seat majority landslide. So we assume he loses.
The Daily Kos Elections crew just moved Arizona into “lean Democratic,” but that is probably still too kind.
McSally (R)
Kelly (D)
Fox News (5/30-6/2)
37
50
Highground (5/18-5/22)
41
51
OH Predictive Insights (5/9-11)
38
51
Appointed Republican Sen. Martha McSally already lost in 2018, and the whole state of Arizona seems to be moving strongly against Republicans. In that Fox News poll, Democratic presumptive nominee Joe Biden is leading 46-42.
In Colorado, no one is pretending that Republican Sen. Cory Gardner has any chance. Even he realizes it—he spent his impeachment time aggressively defending Trump in a state in which Trump will lose by double digits. And so will Gardner. Two polls in early March had former Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper leading by 17 and 18 points. No one has wasted time polling there ever since.
Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins saw her “moderate” veneer shorn off after voting both to acquit Trump in his impeachment trial, and voting to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. A poll last month had Democratic candidate Sarah Gideon with a 51-42 lead. The race has been underpolled, but Collins ranks amongst the most unpopular senators in the country in a state that will solidly go blue this fall. She can’t count on ticket splitters anymore.
And in North Carolina, incumbent Sen. Thom Tillis is looking weak, weak, weak:
Tillis (R)
Cunningham (D)
PPP (6/2-3)
41
43
Meeting Street Insights (5/9-13)
44
46
Civiqs (5/2-4)
41
50
Meredith College (4/27-28)
34
44
Any incumbent below 45% is generally considered to be toast. People are looking for an alternative.
Losing Alabama but winning Arizona, Colorado, Maine, and North Carolina gets us to a 50-50 Senate. At this stage of the cycle, given current trends, this is the most likely outcome.
TIER TWO RACES
These are races in which Republicans currently have the edge, but are in play.
Georgia has two Senate seats in play: a regular election and a special one. The only recent polling is courtesy of Civiqs, which found both Senate seats effectively tied. The reason the GOP has the edge is that Georgia has a Jim Crow-era law that requires candidates to win with 50% of the vote. If none get it in November, the top two vote-getters advance to a runoff election in January.
Historically, the GOP has done much better in those runoff elections. I suspect this time will be different, but gut feelings don’t trump history. This is a true tossup for both seats.
Montana pits an incumbent Republicans against the current popular Democratic governor. Montana is notoriously difficult to poll, but the only one to try recently—a sketchy-looking Montana State University effort—had Democrat Steve Bullock ahead 46-39. Trump will win the state, so we’re relying on ticket splitters to carry the day. Luckily, 1) Montana has a long history of split tickets—it currently has a Democratic governor and Democratic U.S. Senator despite being solidly red at the presidential level, and 2) Trump’s approvals in Montana have been in a steady decline over the last 12 months, from a net +12, to +4 today. And the worse Trump does in the state, even if he wins it, the fewer crossover votes Bullock needs to win.
Depending on how these two states shake out, the Democrats can end up anywhere from the barest 50-50 majority to a better-looking 53-47 one.
TIER THREE RACES
Incumbent Iowa Republican Sen. Joni Ernst had appeared relatively safe earlier this year. Lily-white Iowa looked like another 10-point Trump win, and Ernst seemed to be doing whatever it was that was necessary to cruise to reelection. But the coronavirus has hit Iowa hard, and the trade wars with China have hammered its farmers. And now, any hope of a positive resolution has evaporated as Trump has decided to blame China for his own failures. In fact, Trump’s approvals are underwater in Iowa 47-50, according to Civiqs’ daily tracker.
Polling has been scant, but just yesterday Public Policy Polling released a poll showing the Democratic challenger up 45-43. Civiqs has a poll in the field right now and we’ll have results next Tuesday or Wednesday. This one may be soon graduating to the second tier.
Kansas. Kansas! Yes, Kansas. I explain Kansas here. Botton line: It’s tough, but given Kansas’ high education levels and an ongoing civil war between the state Republican Party’s moderate and crazy wings, we have a shot.
Texas also gets included in this tier. Incumbent Republican John Cornyn isn't as hated as Ted Cruz, who was almost defeated in 2018. And there is no public polling to give us a sense of the state of this race. But the state is trending blue, and a Public Policy Polling poll released today showed the state a 48-48 tie in the presidential election. Honestly, not sure I buy it, not without additional confirmation. But the demographic trends are certainly in our favor. Have they moved enough to put this Senate seat in contention? I’m hopeful but skeptical.
TIER FOUR RACES
These are races in which we have great candidates who are raising buttloads of cash, but they are in tough Republican states.
In Kentucky, odious Republican Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is unpopular, but 1) he delivers more bacon than anyone else in the Senate—Kentucky is the ultimate mooch state, and 2) Kentucky gives Trump some of his highest approval ratings in the country (a rough count says seventh highest).
Those are some pretty strong headwinds to fight no matter how good your candidate is and how much money she has.
And in the same vein, South Carolina’s Lindsey Graham is protected by the partisanship of his state—the only one on both coasts that gives Trump a positive approval rating. Civiqs has the race tied 42-42, but undecideds are heavily Republican and the state suffers from extreme racial polarization. Southern whites, in general, just don’t vote Democratic.
The Senate will be at least 50-50. Our job is to drag as many of these races across the finish line as we can. Can we make it 55-45? Or even more than that?
It’s a legit roadmap of the 2020 presidential election.
Here's the current electoral map picture:
It’s a little confusing, since the color blue in the first map “approves of Trump,” while in the second map it means the exact opposite. But it’s still not too hard to sort out: Blue states really don’t like Trump. Red states like Trump. There are the edge-case states—states that are evenly divided on the question, but aren’t current battlegrounds (Iowa, Montana, New Mexico, Ohio, South Carolina, Texas, and Utah). And then there are the seven battlegrounds—all states that voted for Trump in 2016, and all states in which his numbers are currently net-negative.
Approve
DisapproVe
net
Arizona
42
56
-14
Florida
46
51
-5
Georgia
45
51
-6
Michigan
42
55
-13
North Carolina
45
53
-8
Pennsylvania
44
52
-8
Wisconsin
45
53
-8
Arizona continues to surprise. Who would’ve thought it looks better for presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden than Pennsylvania does? And worse for Trump, his numbers are trending even lower. For example, let’s look at Arizona:
Since the coronavirus pandemic hit, Trump has gone from -10 net favorables in Arizona, to -14. Arizona has around 4 million registered voter. Going from -10 to -14 net favorability means that around 160,000 Arizona voters changed their mind about Trump.
Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema won the state by just 56,000 votes in 2018. Democrats picked up the secretary of state office by 20,000 votes. These shifts in public opinion may seem small, but in a tight battleground state, every point matters. And it should be noted, the shift in job approvals in Arizona started during the impeachment hearings. They really did set the stage.
Florida is Florida, balanced on a razor’s edge, but once again, impeachment took a bite out of Trump, and the pandemic is further widening the split. Looking at Michigan, however, and impeachment didn’t leave any mark, but the pandemic is:
Click around and see for yourself, but the virus is having an impact in every one of these battleground states. (In every state, actually, but only the battlegrounds are close enough for it to matter.) This is the reason much of the battleground polling lately has been so gaudy-good for Joe Biden and Democratic down-ballot candidates (like the recent Civiqs surveys out of North Carolina and Georgia. Even South Carolina looked better than 2016 numbers).
Will it stay that way? We can’t assume that, of course. It helps us that Trump isn’t trying to actually win new voters. The a-hole is running ads mocking Biden for wearing a mask, when 72% of Americans support wearing masks. He's playing to his peanut gallery. He’s certainly not trying to minimize the continued death toll, having given up entirely on the matter. He’d rather pretend everything is fine so states open up as quickly and as fully as possible. And while some renewed economic activity is inevitable as restrictions loosen up, that still won’t save tens of millions of jobs before November.
So will Trump be able to recapture that support he’s recently lost? It’s possible! The charts obviously do show their up-and-down fluctuations over the last four years. A skilled, capable, compassionate, and focused leader could certainly manage to parlay this crisis into broad popular support. President George W. Bush hit 90% approvals after 9/11, despite having ignored a report that literally warned that al-Qaida was about to strike the nation. The public wants to rally around their leader in a crisis.
Trump isn’t skilled or compassionate or capable. He’s a barely functioning adult. And this crisis has made it harder and harder for people to cling to the notion that Trump is actually a good president.
It’s hard for people to admit that their sincerely held beliefs were wrong. And politics is now akin to religion—part of one’s self-identity. Leaving the Republican Party is like leaving a cult. Not everyone can manage it. And yet, it’s happening. It happened in 2018, with suburban white women testing the waters, and the water was fine! Newly re-minted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wasn’t the boogeyman! She ended up being nothing like that asshole in the Senate, Mitch McConnell.
And now it’s time to leave the Cult of MAGA, and it’s happening, little by little, inch by inch. It’s been enough to spot Biden a clear lead in the Electoral College, it has been enough to deprive Trump of an expanded map, it has been enough to create two new battleground states in previously red (and solidly red!) Arizona and Georgia.
Can Trump reverse that trend? Sure, it’s within the realm of possibility, but no, he won’t. He can’t. He probably doesn’t even want to.
