That was after another tightening up tho.
I also get the vibes based on how many people really didn’t like Harris(and how many people initially expected Biden to quit in less than two weeks) that if everyone had full hindsight they would have rallied around Biden and kept the media on damage control like they were the day after the debate. Problem is by the time it became clear Harris was the only other option(second week in) and by the time it became clear a quick Biden surrender wasn’t going to happen(third week) too much damage had been done to Biden by the campaign to remove him and it couldn’t really be undone.
I agree in that too much damage had been done to the Biden Campaign for Biden to remain in the race, but I think that would have been a mistake (electorally) to rally around him in spite of his debate performance. He’s 81 and his debate performance only proved his age wasn’t just a republican talking point and was a real problem. I think rallying around him would have failed to capture important swing state voters.
All that being said, I think Harris is preferable to 2024 Biden, though not as good as 2020 or 2016 Biden would be.
They ended up rallying around her fine. That risk is over.
Now it’s an endurance game. Biden’s been in a slump since Summer 2023 and has slowly been bleeding support, and then there were 3 and 1/2 weeks of utter chaos and tanking. You can’t recover from that overnight, it’s been 3 nights and she’s still not 100% done building back from the last months damage to the status quo, poll averages post-acceptance are currently 0% lead(One two point ahead, one two point behind) or if you average for their range with Biden prior, 0.1% in favor of Harris, though the sample size is too small, give it another week.
That’s still comparable or slightly behind June 2024 Biden and a good bit behind Summer 2023 Biden(which was the last point where he’d have strong odds of winning if an election happened right then). The Democrats are the ones who need to close the gap this time, not Trump like the last two elections(in 2016 he closed the gap hard in October, in 2020 he failed). Also due to both the Electoral College and the fact that Trump voters(even nowadays, albeit not to the same significant error margins in 2016 they’ve compensated a bit) under-report on polls in Blue and Purple States(Especially female Trump voters, who I suspect are the biggest blind spot in regards to the young internet demographics), you need a 3 point lead for a solid win. 2 point lead is too close to call leaning R and 1 point lead is probably a loss. Harris is like, 0.1 point lead at best RN and the sample size is too small. Way better than Biden was last week, but an election this weekend favors Trump still(eh maybe not weekend weekend the base is super stirred up, but like a week from now).
There’s also 3 X Factors to consider. The 3rd Parties this year lean more left than usual, same way in 2020 they leaned more right than usual. The Libertarians(who draw from both sides, but usually more Republicans) picked a former Democrat Chase Oliver and are currently taking 60% from Democrats. The Green Party has gotten back on their feat and Jill Stein has better name recognition than ANYONE else Third Party. The PSL Marxists are surging and are on track to surpass the Constitutionalists for 5th biggest party. The Constitution Party(the only one of the big set still firmly leaning more right) also picked someone who was a democrat, albeit a Republican prior so a DINO. Still less right than usual, so probably more 75% R instead of 90% R. Also they’re falling behind these last few years. Had no third parties run Trump probably would have won 2020. There’s the wild card that is RFK Jr too. Does he pull more Never Trumpers or more Biden Bros? Were those leaks about him working for Trump true, and if they weren’t, did the Republicans make it up to pressure him to quit and stop stealing their votes, or the inverse? He’s polling better than Gary Johnson in 2016 and Ralph Nader in 2000(both of whom underpreformed the polls pretty badly, but still, half of a higher number still ends in a higher number compared to half of a lower number).
Secondly Israel. Are the Democrats going to throw Biden under the bus and blame every problem there on him(Washes Kamala’s hands clean, that’s good, but also risks losing a lot of Biden Loyalists and Casually Racist Democrats to RFK Jr) OR double down(Opposite issue, keeps the Biden Psychos in line, but risks weakening Kamala’s youth turnout). This whole thing is what pushed Biden firmly into losing all polls from then on out. If it remains the low level situation it is it probably won’t be a make or break, but if the Hezbollah War kicks off the choice will matter massively and picking wrong could be a disaster. It’s weighing who’s riskier to temp losing: Biden Diehards and Israeli Nationalists, or Young Leftists and Arab Immigrants. Do you risk the former going to RFK or Chase Oliver, or the latter going to Jill Stein and Claudia Da La Cruz? A choice will have to happen.
Thirdly, Pennsylvania. The one state where nothing is going to plan. White voters are the key demographic here, Harris is behind compared to Biden and even more behind compared to Trump. Scranton Joe had the home state edge, Kamala doesn’t(Picking Shapiro would mostly fix this, albeit maybe not quite to the same degree on it’s own). Also, the Trump shooting happened right here, here here, the people at the Rally and their families(more importantly) are almost all from PA. The Post-Shooting bump here is bigger than in any other state, relying on poor MAGA turnout like in 2022 is not going to work, especially not here. And it’s also the single most important state. If the Dem’s can’t yank Georgia(which is more possible than a month ago thanks to Harris, but the GOP spent 3 years fortifying it out of fear of cracking the solid south, they worked hard to bring it back in 2021 and 2022 and it was razor tight in 2020) they NEED Pensylvania or that’s it, game over. They could win Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona(all looking ok right now, Michigan is touch and go) and Nevada(much much less so, but the least important of the 5) and still lose 270-268 without PA. Lady Luck giveth and she taketh, nationally Harris has better odds than Biden, but in the state where it matters most everything is playing against her this last month.
I really think we might just have to wait for the polls to come out that are specifically showing Harris at the top of the ticket. Her VP candidate might also influence things as well (as a side note, I have personally taken a liking to the idea of Arizona Senator Mark Kelly; both sides of the aisle have to admit that being an astronaut is fucking cool).
That said, I think Biden stepping aside has seriously shifted (or at the very least altered) the narrative; the republicans had been painting him as a weak, old, power-hungry and selfish man who was the mastermind behind stealing the 2020 election from Donald Trump. That image clashes with Biden seeing his own weakness and willingly stepping aside for the good of his country in an act his opponent is flat-out incapable of considering. I will not be surprised if his own approval ratings rise because of this act.
Furthermore, the Democratic base looks to be completely reenergized by Biden’s historic decision and they’ve successfully rallied around Harris in a way I thought the polls had indicated wasn’t possible. In only one 24-hour period, she raised $81 million with nearly 900,000 individual donations. Clearly, there is some strong grassroots support there and excitement that the polls were missing, no?
Basically, the general point I’m getting at is I think we need to wait-and-see what the polls look like with Biden not on them. As someone who was always very supportive of Joe Biden’s candidacy and admittedly only realized his age was such a problem when I watched the debate on June 27, I cannot help but wonder how much Biden‘s age was dragging down the entire ticket.
Regarding RFK, my instincts say he will probably pull more from Trump’s base than the Democrats. True, he does have “Kennedy” in his last name, but he’s also anti-vaccines, talks about having a worm in his brain, and is very prone to discussing conspiracies. Given that the Democratic base tends to be a little bit more educated and than the Republican base, I anticipate him pulling more from Trump than Harris. (I acknowledge though that I may just be projecting my own thoughts onto RFK voters here.)
I think your point regarding Israel rings true; they are a wildcard, and Netanyahu’s preference for Trump complicates things. Given Harris is supposed to be Biden’s right-hand woman I’m not sure if she can be completely separated from the administrations stance on the Israel-Gaza war. Two things I think are important to note are that Hezbollah has been causing problems in the region for years, and many of Israel’s own citizens are not that supportive of Netanyahu remaining in charge. In the end though, Israel is a very sticky situation that represents a danger to Democrats keeping the White House because it could very easily fracture their coalition and energize the Republican base.
Regarding which voter groups in the democratic coalition might be fractured, I think we have the least to worry from Biden Bros; I don’t think there’s many Biden die-hards that will not vote for Harris because much of his legacy will be determined by whether or not she wins. Also, a fundamental difference between the Republican base and the Democratic base is the former seems to be very loyal to Donald Trump as a person even if they do not care too much for (or even know much about) his policies. In contrast, the latter seems to care more about their policies than they do their candidate, which is evidenced by the fact Biden stepped aside; there’s no fanatical loyalty to Biden.
As for which parts of the democratic base might be fractured most easily, my bet would be leftists and Arabs. Leftists have historically broken off, and Arabs are much more invested in the goings-on in the Middle East and are especially affected by the Israel-Gaza War. That being said, it is clear Trump would be far worse for both groups; many leftists have acknowledged that not voting for Hillary Clinton in 2016 was a mistake, and Trump would happily bomb Gaza so hard it would fall off into the Mediterranean.
As for Pennsylvania, I agree it will be an uphill battle. The attempted assassination of Donald Trump happening there will drive up voter turnout and sympathy for Republicans. My first initial thought to offset this was to put Josh Shapiro on the ticket, but then it turns out he had settled a sexual harassment claim last year; in my opinion, that makes it difficult to justify putting him on the ticket while attacking Trump as a sexual predator. As a result, I think our best bet is to drive up voter turnout in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh cities and inform suburbanites about threats to things such as women’s rights. Trump’s actual policies seem to be very unpopular, even amongst some republicans.
But the end, I think we’ll just have to wait-and-see. Who knows - perhaps the possibility of black woman being president may drive up voter turnout in cities in the rust belt with a high black population such as Detroit (~80%,) Cleveland (~50%), Pittsburgh (~65%), Philadelphia (~40%) or even down south in Atlanta (~50%). It’s also certainly possible that I just have a rosier outlook on things right now because I feel so relieved that Biden actually did what was right, stepped aside and passed the torch to Harris.
Oh and the worm in his brain isn’t a conspiracy, that’s just something that happens if you eat pork raw with a bit of bad luck, Trichinosis. It was on the first episode of House MD. You can find medical scans of people with it in their muscles if you look and are brave.
They found it when they were checking him after the mercury poisoning he got.
Oh and we got a third post-biden poll.
It’s a tie.
So -2, +2, and tie, still not enough to say anything definitive, but I am definitely chuckling at it somehow staying at zero with an odd number
Oh Harris got a huge bump, but as I said it’s coming out of a nasty pit that Biden slowly dug over a year and then rapidly deepened in the 3 and a half weeks before stepping down. Also the honeymoon period is real, even Obama felt it in 2010. This exponential growth isn’t going to hold daily for 4 months, no amount of Jeb memes will make that happen.
Also the bulk of that bump is black voters and to a lesser extent young women(Biden was actually two points behind in the female voter believe it or not, Harris was 50/50 even before being picked, probably ahead now), which aren’t the biggest demographics in the swing states(Outside of Georgia, but as I said there’s a lot of things against that. I ran the numbers. In 2020, if third parties didn’t vote at all in 2020 Georgia is the only state that 100% no doubt changes outcome and goes red.). Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are both mostly white and a bit on the older side. The biggest non-white groups are Hispanics who are not leaning super hard either way(Trump actually made huge gains with Hispanics in 2020 compared to 2016 thanks to easing up on the Mexico rhetoric and the fact culturally many many Hispanics are actually very conservative and/or basically white. The democrats mostly have the Haitian-DR guys, the Cubans went full GOP, the rest are pretty split). Michigan has the largest Arab community in the country who are probably going to have the highest (did not vote) ratio of anyone, otherwise pretty white. Detroit is also not a great mascot for successful big city.
Also on the note of Georgia and third party ratios, that also impacted the last two elections. In 2020, for example, Georgia is safely red without third parties. Arizona would probably also go Republican though that’s iffier and Wisconsin would be too close to call leaning blue. . Narrow Biden victory or 2000 scenario for Trump. For context in 2016 the effect is even greater, no third parties means Trump takes New Hampshire and Minnesota, and 4 more - New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada and Maine-State are all within the margins and too close to say. The Popular Vote is razor thin and could go either way depending on those states margins with the Libertarian voters, but Trump would lean winning that too in 2016 without 3rd party.
That’s another thing to consider. Third Parties have been mostly right leaning since 2008 if not 2004. 2000 was the last one in which they firmly were left leaning(Ralph Nader did gang busters and the Libertarians of the era actually pulled slightly more from democrats, Reform Party swung right, but was falling apart, Constitution Party did crap all), this was also probably true in 1996 and 1992 given the Reform Party was pretty evenly split and the Greens were the second strongest third party by far. 2016 was the peak of this, Trump would have won by Obama 2012 margins if not for third parties and probably would have won the popular vote. In 2020 they at least cost him Georgia and depending on how a few thousand Libertarians in Wisconsin and Arizona voted possibly the election(Although let’s be real if it came down to one state with razor thin margins Trump would pull a Bush and take it).
But times are changing. 2020 was already a far weaker effect than 2016. And it’s not just about RFK.
The Libertarians have since swung left again, ousting most of the Gary Johnson era guys, Chase Oliver is a democrat. Polls suggest in the last month or two they’ve actually been pulling more democrats than republicans for the first time since 2004. (In 2002 they were 43 R - 57 D, but by 2006 it was 59 R to 41 D and it probably peaked at 70+ R around the Tea Party era and has been sliding left since).
Jill Stein has really good name recognition and has been around longer than any other third party name, they’re also set to either match or overtake the Libertarians for the first time since 2010. They lean like 80-85% left voters and the only reason it isn’t higher is the Russia issue. They also no longer have the bad press coming from Canada they did in 2020(Canada’s green party was imploding at the time and trickle over news confused some people).
The Constitution Party(which pulls big margins from the right) has never been able to have a surge year like the other two, they topped out at 0.193% of the vote compared to 3 or 4%, They’ve always been the ‘third party of the third parties’ so to speak. And they’re weakening further. And to make things more complicated the guy they picked this year is a DINOcrat, which while it’s not enough to change the ratios massively it probably shifts a few percentage points, 85% R to 80% R or something.
There’s also the surging new guy on the block, the Party of Socialism and Liberation, which has grown massively since 2016 and it set to outpreform the Constitution Party this year and potentially yank their Number 5/Number 3 spot. Probably 95%+ democrats, albeit they mostly operate in hard blue states so unlikely to hurt swing states,
Oh and there’s Rocky Fuente. I don’t know what to say about him. He’s a coalition candidate of several small third parties, some of whom are left local parties, one is an old Bernie Bro party, some are old rightist parties from the Reform era, there’s a few newer alt right ones, and he WAS the Reform Party guy last time albeit they went with RFK now. He’s been both a democrat and a republican and has switched third parties 3 or 4 times. I think he’s pulling mostly 50-50 and he’s not doing well enough for the margins to matter, i dunno. The kind of folks who support someone like that probably are never voting mainline anyway let’s be real.
And then there’s RFK Jr, the wild card. When he first entered everyone said he was a Trump Spoiler, then in May and June and July he was suddenly hurting Biden, and now I’m hearing the first one again. So it’s probably not a crazy huge margin either way, 60-40 or tighter. Ross Perot was so evenly pulling people still debate which party he hurt more in 1992(General consensus these days is probably Bush, but Clinton was winning no matter what and maybe just snagged one or two states extra. That’s debated though, at the time Clinton blamed him for narrowing his victory so…). I will say he is seemingly snagging both Niki Haley types and Joe Biden types so we’ll see. He’s got more numbers for the rest combined so it really comes down to him. Though I do note if it leans left that’s not good combined with everything else, and if it leans right the effect is mostly neutralized by all the prior stuff(also if he leans right and then drops out to endorse Trump at the last minute in October that’s bad since almost certainly a few people who would been swayed Dem otherwise wouldn’t have time to change their minds. Meanwhile if he leans left and drops out that helps Harris).
I will also note Chase Oliver is a Georgia politician, only left the democrats due to Iraq, and is pro-abortion. This isn’t Gary Johnson. He’s the reason I’m extremely certain Harris isn’t snagging Georgia. The 3rd parties were actively stealing Trump voters in 2020 and cost him the state, now the trend has reversed. None of the others have swing state edges of note.
The Third Parties have been snagging a point or two away from the Republicans since George Bush’s era and I think a lot of people forgot that’s not a permanent direction for them.
Short have lead with this, but the 0.0% and 0.1% numbers ARE based on post-Biden dropout polls. The only two we have from reputable sources.
One put Trump +2 and one put Harris +2. That averages out to 0. I also checked how they both polled Biden in his final month to compare. One put Trump +1 and the other Trump + 5. The average was 3.1 so accounting for that error Harris squeeks out a tiny lead in the adjusted current polls. Sample size is way too small.
I also don’t think the third party shift on it’s own is a make or break factor, but combine that with another nasty war involving Israel, or Ukraine suffers a bad loss(which is uh…not looking good right now, Russia’s about to knock out the main supply road and just encircled the unit guarding it last night), or some media runs with the genocide in Sudan and blames the admin for doing nothing about it, or something goes wrong with the VP(Bad debate against Vance or some sort of scandal), or even something like a refinery blows up in October and gas prices explode election week, and suddenly things are razor thin again.
Forgot to mention, but there’s also Cornell West. He was originally a Green, then a Peoples Party(THE Bernie Bro party) candidate, and then Green again and now he’s independent with some micro parties on his side. He’s polling only slightly behind Stein and is actually ahead of Chase Oliver. He’s black, he’s progressive, he’s got a civil rights record, and he’s a church boy. Annnd he’s about to get on the Georgia ballot. Which is also Chase “Abortion good, unemployment bad” Olivers best state. And I think Stein will also be on the ballot there.
Can we at least agree Georgia isn’t fucking happening?
I do agree that Georgia is probably not happening. To say the margins were razor thin in 2020 is an understatement. If I recall, it was only by 11,000 votes. Trump and the Republicans have been working overtime to make sure that doesn’t happen again.
If I recall, this same poll had Trump up around 10 points a week ago with Biden at the top of the ticket, and most of these are still within the margin of error. Emerson also overestimated Republican support in 2022, but I note that results tend to be different when Trump is not on the ballot. It’s also less than a week since Harris took over, and this is probably including Trump’s attempted assassination bump and convention bump.
Harris is only just starting to campaign and hasn’t even picked a running mate yet. So, I think we will have to wait until maybe next week to see what things actually look like. It’s possible we won’t actually get a good picture until after the DNC, too.
I also have a hunch (read - no real data lol) that at least some third-party support this election cycle was protesting not just Biden and Trump, but also the age of both candidates; now that one of them is a young, spry 59 years old, I do think some will may over to Harris.
2022 had poor MAGA turnout, Trump was at his weakest in the party late 2022 and early 2023 and for a bit it looked like DeSantis would take over the movement as the ‘smarter Trump’, until he opened his mouth of course
That was after another tightening up tho. I also get the vibes based on how many people really didn’t like Harris(and how many people initially expected Biden to quit in less than two weeks) that if everyone had full hindsight they would have rallied around Biden and kept the media on damage control like they were the day after the debate. Problem is by the time it became clear Harris was the only other option(second week in) and by the time it became clear a quick Biden surrender wasn’t going to happen(third week) too much damage had been done to Biden by the campaign to remove him and it couldn’t really be undone.
I agree in that too much damage had been done to the Biden Campaign for Biden to remain in the race, but I think that would have been a mistake (electorally) to rally around him in spite of his debate performance. He’s 81 and his debate performance only proved his age wasn’t just a republican talking point and was a real problem. I think rallying around him would have failed to capture important swing state voters.
All that being said, I think Harris is preferable to 2024 Biden, though not as good as 2020 or 2016 Biden would be.
They ended up rallying around her fine. That risk is over.
Now it’s an endurance game. Biden’s been in a slump since Summer 2023 and has slowly been bleeding support, and then there were 3 and 1/2 weeks of utter chaos and tanking. You can’t recover from that overnight, it’s been 3 nights and she’s still not 100% done building back from the last months damage to the status quo, poll averages post-acceptance are currently 0% lead(One two point ahead, one two point behind) or if you average for their range with Biden prior, 0.1% in favor of Harris, though the sample size is too small, give it another week.
That’s still comparable or slightly behind June 2024 Biden and a good bit behind Summer 2023 Biden(which was the last point where he’d have strong odds of winning if an election happened right then). The Democrats are the ones who need to close the gap this time, not Trump like the last two elections(in 2016 he closed the gap hard in October, in 2020 he failed). Also due to both the Electoral College and the fact that Trump voters(even nowadays, albeit not to the same significant error margins in 2016 they’ve compensated a bit) under-report on polls in Blue and Purple States(Especially female Trump voters, who I suspect are the biggest blind spot in regards to the young internet demographics), you need a 3 point lead for a solid win. 2 point lead is too close to call leaning R and 1 point lead is probably a loss. Harris is like, 0.1 point lead at best RN and the sample size is too small. Way better than Biden was last week, but an election this weekend favors Trump still(eh maybe not weekend weekend the base is super stirred up, but like a week from now).
There’s also 3 X Factors to consider. The 3rd Parties this year lean more left than usual, same way in 2020 they leaned more right than usual. The Libertarians(who draw from both sides, but usually more Republicans) picked a former Democrat Chase Oliver and are currently taking 60% from Democrats. The Green Party has gotten back on their feat and Jill Stein has better name recognition than ANYONE else Third Party. The PSL Marxists are surging and are on track to surpass the Constitutionalists for 5th biggest party. The Constitution Party(the only one of the big set still firmly leaning more right) also picked someone who was a democrat, albeit a Republican prior so a DINO. Still less right than usual, so probably more 75% R instead of 90% R. Also they’re falling behind these last few years. Had no third parties run Trump probably would have won 2020. There’s the wild card that is RFK Jr too. Does he pull more Never Trumpers or more Biden Bros? Were those leaks about him working for Trump true, and if they weren’t, did the Republicans make it up to pressure him to quit and stop stealing their votes, or the inverse? He’s polling better than Gary Johnson in 2016 and Ralph Nader in 2000(both of whom underpreformed the polls pretty badly, but still, half of a higher number still ends in a higher number compared to half of a lower number).
Secondly Israel. Are the Democrats going to throw Biden under the bus and blame every problem there on him(Washes Kamala’s hands clean, that’s good, but also risks losing a lot of Biden Loyalists and Casually Racist Democrats to RFK Jr) OR double down(Opposite issue, keeps the Biden Psychos in line, but risks weakening Kamala’s youth turnout). This whole thing is what pushed Biden firmly into losing all polls from then on out. If it remains the low level situation it is it probably won’t be a make or break, but if the Hezbollah War kicks off the choice will matter massively and picking wrong could be a disaster. It’s weighing who’s riskier to temp losing: Biden Diehards and Israeli Nationalists, or Young Leftists and Arab Immigrants. Do you risk the former going to RFK or Chase Oliver, or the latter going to Jill Stein and Claudia Da La Cruz? A choice will have to happen.
Thirdly, Pennsylvania. The one state where nothing is going to plan. White voters are the key demographic here, Harris is behind compared to Biden and even more behind compared to Trump. Scranton Joe had the home state edge, Kamala doesn’t(Picking Shapiro would mostly fix this, albeit maybe not quite to the same degree on it’s own). Also, the Trump shooting happened right here, here here, the people at the Rally and their families(more importantly) are almost all from PA. The Post-Shooting bump here is bigger than in any other state, relying on poor MAGA turnout like in 2022 is not going to work, especially not here. And it’s also the single most important state. If the Dem’s can’t yank Georgia(which is more possible than a month ago thanks to Harris, but the GOP spent 3 years fortifying it out of fear of cracking the solid south, they worked hard to bring it back in 2021 and 2022 and it was razor tight in 2020) they NEED Pensylvania or that’s it, game over. They could win Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona(all looking ok right now, Michigan is touch and go) and Nevada(much much less so, but the least important of the 5) and still lose 270-268 without PA. Lady Luck giveth and she taketh, nationally Harris has better odds than Biden, but in the state where it matters most everything is playing against her this last month.
I really think we might just have to wait for the polls to come out that are specifically showing Harris at the top of the ticket. Her VP candidate might also influence things as well (as a side note, I have personally taken a liking to the idea of Arizona Senator Mark Kelly; both sides of the aisle have to admit that being an astronaut is fucking cool).
That said, I think Biden stepping aside has seriously shifted (or at the very least altered) the narrative; the republicans had been painting him as a weak, old, power-hungry and selfish man who was the mastermind behind stealing the 2020 election from Donald Trump. That image clashes with Biden seeing his own weakness and willingly stepping aside for the good of his country in an act his opponent is flat-out incapable of considering. I will not be surprised if his own approval ratings rise because of this act.
Furthermore, the Democratic base looks to be completely reenergized by Biden’s historic decision and they’ve successfully rallied around Harris in a way I thought the polls had indicated wasn’t possible. In only one 24-hour period, she raised $81 million with nearly 900,000 individual donations. Clearly, there is some strong grassroots support there and excitement that the polls were missing, no?
Basically, the general point I’m getting at is I think we need to wait-and-see what the polls look like with Biden not on them. As someone who was always very supportive of Joe Biden’s candidacy and admittedly only realized his age was such a problem when I watched the debate on June 27, I cannot help but wonder how much Biden‘s age was dragging down the entire ticket.
Regarding RFK, my instincts say he will probably pull more from Trump’s base than the Democrats. True, he does have “Kennedy” in his last name, but he’s also anti-vaccines, talks about having a worm in his brain, and is very prone to discussing conspiracies. Given that the Democratic base tends to be a little bit more educated and than the Republican base, I anticipate him pulling more from Trump than Harris. (I acknowledge though that I may just be projecting my own thoughts onto RFK voters here.)
I think your point regarding Israel rings true; they are a wildcard, and Netanyahu’s preference for Trump complicates things. Given Harris is supposed to be Biden’s right-hand woman I’m not sure if she can be completely separated from the administrations stance on the Israel-Gaza war. Two things I think are important to note are that Hezbollah has been causing problems in the region for years, and many of Israel’s own citizens are not that supportive of Netanyahu remaining in charge. In the end though, Israel is a very sticky situation that represents a danger to Democrats keeping the White House because it could very easily fracture their coalition and energize the Republican base.
Regarding which voter groups in the democratic coalition might be fractured, I think we have the least to worry from Biden Bros; I don’t think there’s many Biden die-hards that will not vote for Harris because much of his legacy will be determined by whether or not she wins. Also, a fundamental difference between the Republican base and the Democratic base is the former seems to be very loyal to Donald Trump as a person even if they do not care too much for (or even know much about) his policies. In contrast, the latter seems to care more about their policies than they do their candidate, which is evidenced by the fact Biden stepped aside; there’s no fanatical loyalty to Biden.
As for which parts of the democratic base might be fractured most easily, my bet would be leftists and Arabs. Leftists have historically broken off, and Arabs are much more invested in the goings-on in the Middle East and are especially affected by the Israel-Gaza War. That being said, it is clear Trump would be far worse for both groups; many leftists have acknowledged that not voting for Hillary Clinton in 2016 was a mistake, and Trump would happily bomb Gaza so hard it would fall off into the Mediterranean.
As for Pennsylvania, I agree it will be an uphill battle. The attempted assassination of Donald Trump happening there will drive up voter turnout and sympathy for Republicans. My first initial thought to offset this was to put Josh Shapiro on the ticket, but then it turns out he had settled a sexual harassment claim last year; in my opinion, that makes it difficult to justify putting him on the ticket while attacking Trump as a sexual predator. As a result, I think our best bet is to drive up voter turnout in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh cities and inform suburbanites about threats to things such as women’s rights. Trump’s actual policies seem to be very unpopular, even amongst some republicans.
But the end, I think we’ll just have to wait-and-see. Who knows - perhaps the possibility of black woman being president may drive up voter turnout in cities in the rust belt with a high black population such as Detroit (~80%,) Cleveland (~50%), Pittsburgh (~65%), Philadelphia (~40%) or even down south in Atlanta (~50%). It’s also certainly possible that I just have a rosier outlook on things right now because I feel so relieved that Biden actually did what was right, stepped aside and passed the torch to Harris.
Edit: grammar, spelling, phrasing
Oh and the worm in his brain isn’t a conspiracy, that’s just something that happens if you eat pork raw with a bit of bad luck, Trichinosis. It was on the first episode of House MD. You can find medical scans of people with it in their muscles if you look and are brave. They found it when they were checking him after the mercury poisoning he got.
Oh and we got a third post-biden poll. It’s a tie. So -2, +2, and tie, still not enough to say anything definitive, but I am definitely chuckling at it somehow staying at zero with an odd number
Oh Harris got a huge bump, but as I said it’s coming out of a nasty pit that Biden slowly dug over a year and then rapidly deepened in the 3 and a half weeks before stepping down. Also the honeymoon period is real, even Obama felt it in 2010. This exponential growth isn’t going to hold daily for 4 months, no amount of Jeb memes will make that happen.
Also the bulk of that bump is black voters and to a lesser extent young women(Biden was actually two points behind in the female voter believe it or not, Harris was 50/50 even before being picked, probably ahead now), which aren’t the biggest demographics in the swing states(Outside of Georgia, but as I said there’s a lot of things against that. I ran the numbers. In 2020, if third parties didn’t vote at all in 2020 Georgia is the only state that 100% no doubt changes outcome and goes red.). Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are both mostly white and a bit on the older side. The biggest non-white groups are Hispanics who are not leaning super hard either way(Trump actually made huge gains with Hispanics in 2020 compared to 2016 thanks to easing up on the Mexico rhetoric and the fact culturally many many Hispanics are actually very conservative and/or basically white. The democrats mostly have the Haitian-DR guys, the Cubans went full GOP, the rest are pretty split). Michigan has the largest Arab community in the country who are probably going to have the highest (did not vote) ratio of anyone, otherwise pretty white. Detroit is also not a great mascot for successful big city.
Also on the note of Georgia and third party ratios, that also impacted the last two elections. In 2020, for example, Georgia is safely red without third parties. Arizona would probably also go Republican though that’s iffier and Wisconsin would be too close to call leaning blue. . Narrow Biden victory or 2000 scenario for Trump. For context in 2016 the effect is even greater, no third parties means Trump takes New Hampshire and Minnesota, and 4 more - New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada and Maine-State are all within the margins and too close to say. The Popular Vote is razor thin and could go either way depending on those states margins with the Libertarian voters, but Trump would lean winning that too in 2016 without 3rd party.
That’s another thing to consider. Third Parties have been mostly right leaning since 2008 if not 2004. 2000 was the last one in which they firmly were left leaning(Ralph Nader did gang busters and the Libertarians of the era actually pulled slightly more from democrats, Reform Party swung right, but was falling apart, Constitution Party did crap all), this was also probably true in 1996 and 1992 given the Reform Party was pretty evenly split and the Greens were the second strongest third party by far. 2016 was the peak of this, Trump would have won by Obama 2012 margins if not for third parties and probably would have won the popular vote. In 2020 they at least cost him Georgia and depending on how a few thousand Libertarians in Wisconsin and Arizona voted possibly the election(Although let’s be real if it came down to one state with razor thin margins Trump would pull a Bush and take it).
But times are changing. 2020 was already a far weaker effect than 2016. And it’s not just about RFK.
The Libertarians have since swung left again, ousting most of the Gary Johnson era guys, Chase Oliver is a democrat. Polls suggest in the last month or two they’ve actually been pulling more democrats than republicans for the first time since 2004. (In 2002 they were 43 R - 57 D, but by 2006 it was 59 R to 41 D and it probably peaked at 70+ R around the Tea Party era and has been sliding left since).
Jill Stein has really good name recognition and has been around longer than any other third party name, they’re also set to either match or overtake the Libertarians for the first time since 2010. They lean like 80-85% left voters and the only reason it isn’t higher is the Russia issue. They also no longer have the bad press coming from Canada they did in 2020(Canada’s green party was imploding at the time and trickle over news confused some people).
The Constitution Party(which pulls big margins from the right) has never been able to have a surge year like the other two, they topped out at 0.193% of the vote compared to 3 or 4%, They’ve always been the ‘third party of the third parties’ so to speak. And they’re weakening further. And to make things more complicated the guy they picked this year is a DINOcrat, which while it’s not enough to change the ratios massively it probably shifts a few percentage points, 85% R to 80% R or something.
There’s also the surging new guy on the block, the Party of Socialism and Liberation, which has grown massively since 2016 and it set to outpreform the Constitution Party this year and potentially yank their Number 5/Number 3 spot. Probably 95%+ democrats, albeit they mostly operate in hard blue states so unlikely to hurt swing states,
Oh and there’s Rocky Fuente. I don’t know what to say about him. He’s a coalition candidate of several small third parties, some of whom are left local parties, one is an old Bernie Bro party, some are old rightist parties from the Reform era, there’s a few newer alt right ones, and he WAS the Reform Party guy last time albeit they went with RFK now. He’s been both a democrat and a republican and has switched third parties 3 or 4 times. I think he’s pulling mostly 50-50 and he’s not doing well enough for the margins to matter, i dunno. The kind of folks who support someone like that probably are never voting mainline anyway let’s be real.
And then there’s RFK Jr, the wild card. When he first entered everyone said he was a Trump Spoiler, then in May and June and July he was suddenly hurting Biden, and now I’m hearing the first one again. So it’s probably not a crazy huge margin either way, 60-40 or tighter. Ross Perot was so evenly pulling people still debate which party he hurt more in 1992(General consensus these days is probably Bush, but Clinton was winning no matter what and maybe just snagged one or two states extra. That’s debated though, at the time Clinton blamed him for narrowing his victory so…). I will say he is seemingly snagging both Niki Haley types and Joe Biden types so we’ll see. He’s got more numbers for the rest combined so it really comes down to him. Though I do note if it leans left that’s not good combined with everything else, and if it leans right the effect is mostly neutralized by all the prior stuff(also if he leans right and then drops out to endorse Trump at the last minute in October that’s bad since almost certainly a few people who would been swayed Dem otherwise wouldn’t have time to change their minds. Meanwhile if he leans left and drops out that helps Harris).
I will also note Chase Oliver is a Georgia politician, only left the democrats due to Iraq, and is pro-abortion. This isn’t Gary Johnson. He’s the reason I’m extremely certain Harris isn’t snagging Georgia. The 3rd parties were actively stealing Trump voters in 2020 and cost him the state, now the trend has reversed. None of the others have swing state edges of note.
The Third Parties have been snagging a point or two away from the Republicans since George Bush’s era and I think a lot of people forgot that’s not a permanent direction for them.
Short have lead with this, but the 0.0% and 0.1% numbers ARE based on post-Biden dropout polls. The only two we have from reputable sources. One put Trump +2 and one put Harris +2. That averages out to 0. I also checked how they both polled Biden in his final month to compare. One put Trump +1 and the other Trump + 5. The average was 3.1 so accounting for that error Harris squeeks out a tiny lead in the adjusted current polls. Sample size is way too small.
I also don’t think the third party shift on it’s own is a make or break factor, but combine that with another nasty war involving Israel, or Ukraine suffers a bad loss(which is uh…not looking good right now, Russia’s about to knock out the main supply road and just encircled the unit guarding it last night), or some media runs with the genocide in Sudan and blames the admin for doing nothing about it, or something goes wrong with the VP(Bad debate against Vance or some sort of scandal), or even something like a refinery blows up in October and gas prices explode election week, and suddenly things are razor thin again.
Forgot to mention, but there’s also Cornell West. He was originally a Green, then a Peoples Party(THE Bernie Bro party) candidate, and then Green again and now he’s independent with some micro parties on his side. He’s polling only slightly behind Stein and is actually ahead of Chase Oliver. He’s black, he’s progressive, he’s got a civil rights record, and he’s a church boy. Annnd he’s about to get on the Georgia ballot. Which is also Chase “Abortion good, unemployment bad” Olivers best state. And I think Stein will also be on the ballot there.
Can we at least agree Georgia isn’t fucking happening?
I do agree that Georgia is probably not happening. To say the margins were razor thin in 2020 is an understatement. If I recall, it was only by 11,000 votes. Trump and the Republicans have been working overtime to make sure that doesn’t happen again.
As for right now, an Emerson Swing State poll shows:
If I recall, this same poll had Trump up around 10 points a week ago with Biden at the top of the ticket, and most of these are still within the margin of error. Emerson also overestimated Republican support in 2022, but I note that results tend to be different when Trump is not on the ballot. It’s also less than a week since Harris took over, and this is probably including Trump’s attempted assassination bump and convention bump.
Harris is only just starting to campaign and hasn’t even picked a running mate yet. So, I think we will have to wait until maybe next week to see what things actually look like. It’s possible we won’t actually get a good picture until after the DNC, too.
I also have a hunch (read - no real data lol) that at least some third-party support this election cycle was protesting not just Biden and Trump, but also the age of both candidates; now that one of them is a young, spry 59 years old, I do think some will may over to Harris.
2022 had poor MAGA turnout, Trump was at his weakest in the party late 2022 and early 2023 and for a bit it looked like DeSantis would take over the movement as the ‘smarter Trump’, until he opened his mouth of course